In large part, my thoughts on this subject have already been covered by Alan, who has spelled out the most productive analytical framework on the question. To the extent, something called 'anti-racism' is productive is when it engages in concrete material conditions, in a workplace, in regards to specific policing habits, etc. As a practical example, one might look at the appendix to Fletcher and Gapasin's Solidarity Divided. Gapasin looks at how the reform efforts of Transit Local 299 were dependent on challenging the racism and sexism of the former leadership. This wasn't done through simple moralistic nonsense, but through creating new forms of participation, challenging the divisions in the workforce, etc. Gapasin doesn't argue that this solved all the problems of the local, but it created a stronger, more militant union.
When I discussed the situation in Minneapolis around HERE Local 17, you can see a similar situation. The local's willingness to challenge the racism and sexism of the employers, and to put that at the center of their campaign, led to an incredibly successful campaign. The local didn't simply campaign on the position of 'unite and fight' but emphasized the disparate and racialized work structures. It was fight to get everyone something, but the campaign emphasized the need for more resources going to back of the shop folks. In addition, they had a lot more support because of their fight to end the racist AFL-CIO policies on undocumented immigrants.
These were concrete struggles that recognized that class recomposition was dependent on challenging both systemic forms of racism, and their internalization within the forms of organization in the unions.
Doug makes the argument, following the lead of Adolph Reed, that many of the issues of structural economic racism could be ameliorated through race neutral social programs. Probably, but I'm a little hesitant for a couple reasons. 1. There has been a history of such programs being implemented in a manner that reproduces and reinforces racism. I'm notably thinking about the policies of the New Deal in this regard. David Roediger discusses this at length in his recent text, Working Towards Whiteness. 2. Popular forms of racism have been used to legitimate the destruction of a lot of important reform legislation from the New Deal to the policies of the Johnson admin. David Harvey deals with this a bit in his material on Neo-liberalism, and Why Americans Hate Welfare does a more extensive job of spelling out the process.
I'm inclined to suspect that any significant reform legislation is going to avoid the pitfalls of point 1, but even with that, its supporters are going to have to confront the forms of racist common-sense that have legitimated gutting the social safety net. I also feel that the deep structural aspects of economic racism need something beyond this. In this sense, I'm sympathetic to the position that Carrol took a number of years ago, that recognized that the extent of those policies is almost unimaginable.
Finally, the argument has been made that the term 'racism' is used to discuss an extensive amount of phenomena that cannot be dealt with a simple analysis. I certainly agree with this, but couldn't the same statement get made in regards to sexism, but no one seems to be arguing for abandoning sexism and gender as substantial points for any analytical framework. To go back to Alan's point, we need to take an intersectional approach to these questions. I don't think that this is a position analogous to the moralism of Tim Wise or the terrible column written by Harris-Perry.
robert wood
(Incidentally, I wouldn't mind getting to a conversation about BDS. I think I'll try to put something up on that later tonight after my union meeting.)