>>> "Joseph Catron" >>>
On Dec 27, 2007 6:28 PM, Carrol Cox wrote:
> Full fledged modern racism did not develop until the
> Declaration of Independence (All men are created dequal) generate
> impossible contradictions, resolved by racist ideology.
A provocative claim, and one I haven't considered before. Is it original to you?
^^^^ CB: I've long had a similar idea, Carrol.
In Europe, during "feudalism" inequality , a hierarchy of people was the accepted idea ( "received ideology"). With the rise of capitalism, the bourgeoisie introduced notions of equality among "men", as Carrol excerpts from the D of I.
When the Europeans/capitalists undertook conquering the world and encountered other peoples, it was necessary to develop an ideology to justify the unequal treatment, enslavement and colonizing, of these non-European peoples; in order to negate in part the ideology of equality that they had just developed for themselves. Racist ideology met the need to negate partially their recently developed ideology of equality among Europeans. This is why Carrol makes reference to the D of I ideology of "equality" in explaining the development of the racist ideology of inequality.
So, as Carrol says, slavery and colonialism caused racism or racist ideology, not the other way around.