Racism in the Neoliberal Era

Racism in the Neoliberal Era explains how simple racial binaries like black/white are no longer sufficient to explain the persistence of racism, capitalism, and elite white power. The neoliberal era features the largest Black middle class in US history and extreme racial marginalization. Racial languages change the meaning of public and private – political economy’s two fundamental terms. Randolph Hohle focuses on how the origins and expansion of neoliberalism depended on a racial language of white-private/black-public. The language of neoliberalism explains how the white racial frame operates like a web of racial meanings that connect social groups with economic policy, geography, and police brutality. When America was racially segregated, elites consented to political pressure to develop and fund white-public institutions. The Black civil rights movement eliminated legal barriers that prevented racial integration. The elite white response to Black civic inclusion was to deregulate the Voting Rights Act and banking policy. Elites gave themselves tax cuts and implemented austerity measures on government programs to aid the poor. They privatized neighborhoods, schools, and social welfare, creating markets around poverty. They oversaw the mass incarceration and systemic police brutality against people of color. Citizenship was recast as a privilege instead of a right. Neoliberalism is the result of an elite white meta-strategy to maintain political and economic power.

This new edition is thoroughly revised and updated to take account of the further history and debates over neoliberalism in the Trump and Biden eras and the significant social and political discussions around race and racism, policing, housing, health care, and citizenship as they interconnect with the American neoliberal economic and political system. The new edition will be a vital textbook for students, instructors, and researchers in sociology, politics, race, and economics.