Publisher's Hardcover ©2021 | -- |
Racism. United States. History.
Courtesy. Political aspects. United States. History.
Political culture. United States. History.
Equality. United States. History.
Protest movements. United States. History.
United States. Race relations. History.
A political scientist calls for disruptive protests to combat racism.The director of the African-American Studies Program at the University of Detroit, Mercy, Zamalin shows how, throughout U.S. history, calls for civility have been "a tool for silencing dissent, repressing political participation, enforcing economic inequality, and justifying violence upon people of color." Most recently, he points out, civility has been invoked as a way to combat the divisiveness incited by the Trump administration, but Zamalin asserts that civility in everyday life is different from civility in the political "arena of power and struggle." He advocates disruptive direct action-what he calls "civic radicalism"-that has as its goal "liberation for all, regardless of who disagrees." Offering a vivid, though generally familiar, history of racism in the U.S., the author contrasts those who promoted civility with those who urged public protests: Booker T. Washington, for example, against Frederick Douglass. Douglass, Zamalin writes, "saw misuse of power, division, contestation, deceit, and hypocrisy everywhere he looked. But Washington saw the unachieved promise of racial reconciliation, forgiveness, generosity, and compromise" and therefore urged Blacks to keep their place-advice that racists welcomed. Racial reconciliation, Zamalin cautions, "is something of which we must be wary. This is because it can sidestep collective responsibility and instead become about confessing individual guilt, which is no recipe for changing history. Guilt is a depressive emotion that makes one withdraw rather than take action." Martin Luther King Jr. saw as his greatest adversary not the Ku Klux Klan "but the white moderate basking in civility, the rules of which dictated compromise and mutual respect." Zamalin is heartened by recent street protests over racism, inequality, and police brutality, noting that media coverage focusing on the protesters' violence recalls "the civil versus uncivil distinctions elites have always used to interpret popular anti-racist uprisings throughout history."An impassioned argument for public acts of resistance.
Publishers Weekly (Fri Oct 06 00:00:00 CDT 2023)Zamalin (
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Publishers Weekly (Fri Oct 06 00:00:00 CDT 2023)
The first history of racial injustice to examine how civility and white supremacy are linked, and a call for citizens who care about social justice to abandon civility and practice civic radicalism
The idea and practice of civility has always been wielded to silence dissent, repress political participation, and justify violence upon people of color. Although many progressives today are told that we need to be more polite and thoughtful, less rancorous and angry, when we talk about race in America, civility maintains rather than disrupts racial injustice.
Spanning two hundred years, Zamalin’s accessible blend of intellectual history, political biography, and contemporary political criticism shows that civility has never been neutral in its political uses and impacts. The best way to tackle racial inequality is through “civic radicalism,” an alternative to civility found in the actions of Black radical leaders including Frederick Douglass, Harriet Tubman, Ida B. Wells, Martin Luther King Jr., James Baldwin, Malcolm X, and Audre Lorde. Civic radicals shock and provoke people. They name injustice and who is responsible for it. They protest, march, strike, boycott, and mobilize collectively rather than form alliances with those who fundamentally oppose them.
In Against Civility, citizens who care deeply about racial and socioeconomic equality will see that they need to abandon this concept of discreet politeness when it comes to racial justice and instead more fully support disruptive actions and calls for liberation, which have already begun with movements like #MeToo, the Dakota Access Pipeline protests, and Black Lives Matter.
CHAPTER 1
Civility Has Never Been Neutral in Its Uses and Impacts
CHAPTER 2
Civility Distracts from Inequality
CHAPTER 3
Civic Radicals Make Do with What They Have
CHAPTER 4
Civic Radicals Speak Truth to Power
CHAPTER 5
Civic Radicals Believe Racism Is Structural Rather Than Personal
CHAPTER 6
Civility Is Deployed When Democratic Movements Are on the Rise and Reactionaries Are on the Ropes
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
Notes
Index