The American racial order—the beliefs, institutions, and practices
that organize relationships among the nation’s races and
ethnicities—is undergoing its greatest transformation since the
1960s. Creating a New Racial Order takes a groundbreaking look
at the reasons behind this dramatic change, and considers how
different groups of Americans are being affected. Through revealing
narrative and striking research, the authors show that the personal
and political choices of Americans will be critical to how, and how
much, racial hierarchy is redefined in decades to come.
The authors outline
the components that make up a racial order and examine the specific
mechanisms influencing group dynamics in the United States:
immigration, multiracialism, genomic science, and generational
change. Cumulatively, these mechanisms increase heterogeneity within
each racial or ethnic group, and decrease the distance separating
groups from each other. The authors show that individuals are moving
across group boundaries, that genomic science is challenging the
whole concept of race, and that economic variation within groups is
increasing. Above all, young adults understand and practice race
differently from their elders: their formative memories are 9/11,
Hurricane Katrina, and Obama’s election—not civil rights marches,
riots, or the early stages of immigration. Blockages could stymie or
distort these changes, however, so the authors point to essential
policy and political choices.
Portraying a vision,
not of a postracial America, but of a different racial America,
Creating a New Racial Order examines how the structures of
race and ethnicity are altering a nation.