Tag: oppression

Ethics and Critical Race Theory – General and Philosophical Positions

Introduction

In previous posts, I discussed the role of suspicion in critical race theory (CRT), and there I included the influences of Nietzsche, Marx, and Freud. I also touched on the CRT analysis that power structures are based on white privilege and white supremacy. Moreover, critical legal studies helped reinforce the view that law is mainly about power, not morals. Michel Foucault argued that the dominant group’s power is transmitted and normalized through institutions, and radical feminism contributed how power relates to the construction of social roles, which results in largely unnoticed patterns of domination.

Now, I will explore some more key positions of CRT, starting with some general ones. Then I will look at some key philosophical views, including what is real, and how we know things. In the next blog entry, I will look at several key ethical stances of CRT.

Additional, General Tenets of CRT

First, racism is common, and it is not limited to individuals. It also is systemic, which is the focus of CRT. Second, there is racial disparity: there are differences in outcomes (such as for health and economic considerations) based on race. Third is interest convergence: only if the material interests of the majority group align with those of minoritized groups will the majority group cooperate with minorities.

Fourth, races are social constructions which are not fixed, for they are not rooted in biology. Instead, we all share in a common humanity. Roles and expectations are constructs. Fifth is intersectionality. That is, we all have many sources for our “identities” (or, our self-conceptualizations), and these can overlap in many ways to oppress people (e.g., a poor, black poor lesbian).  Sixth, hegemony is “domination by the ruling class and unconscious acceptance of that state of affairs by the subordinate group.”[1]

To help understand CRT better, let’s also look at some of the key philosophical positions of Crits.

Some Key Philosophical Positions

In addition to these key shaping influences, CRT also draws from the broader stream of thought of critical theory (CT). Like we have seen with CRT, critical theorists embraced the view that oppressed groups need to be liberated from their domination by the oppressor group. Moreover, like Marx, key critical theorists, such as Max Horkheimer, Theodor Adorno, and Herbert Marcuse were materialists and thus they rejected essential natures. So did Nietzsche.

If essences were real, they would have many implications. Why? Essences would define something as what kind of thing it is.[2] Foe example, for Aristotle, the essence of being a human is due its having a human soul, and not some other “principle of life.” However, Adorno rejected the idea that reality is objectively real with essential natures, for that leads us “to establish a single order, a single mode of representing and relating to reality.”[3] For him, on such a view, people would tend to fit into the definitions from the majority’s ideology. Yet, such a view was just a construct that undergirded the dominant group’s hegemony. Thus, peoples’ freedom to define their “true” selves would be undermined, leaving them oppressed.[4]

Likewise, Horkheimer believed that humans are nothing but material beings embedded holistically in nature.[5] Further, Marcuse believed reality is socially conditioned. Our “essence” is not some ontological reality. It is just a term for our human potential to achieve the ideals present in culture, which involves overcoming oppression:

Materialist theory thus transcends the given state of fact and moves toward a different potentiality, proceeding from immediate appearance to the essence that appears in it. But here appearance and essence become members of a real antithesis arising from the particular historical structure of the social process of life.[6]

So, what are some implications for their views if there are no essences? First, since there is no essence, such as the soul, to define and ground one’s personal identity (i.e., what makes someone the same person through time and change), it seems our “identity” is something that is definable by us. This can lead to a great sense of unrestricted freedom to not be bound by any of the dominant group’s ideological categories. Instead, people are free to define their “true selves.”

Second, it seems there are no universal qualities, not just for what it means to be authentically human, but also for moral principles and virtues. For example, suppose justice has an essence. Then it seems there would be an identical quality present in each instance of justice, and justice would be a universal quality. Yet, if there are no essences, then each instance would be particular, or nominal: we would call them all instances of justice, yet that is just due to the word we use for them.

Third, if essences are real, they would exist objectively and transcend our own conceptualizations. Yet, on CT and CRT, we are so shaped by our situating factors that all that we know is from a particular, historically situated standpoint. We cannot transcend those limitations and achieve a gaze directly into how reality is, apart from our “situatedness.” That is a strongly nominalist view. Özlem Sensoy and Robin DiAngelo, who seem strongly influenced by CRT, claim that knowledge is not “outside of human interests, perspectives, and values”; instead, it “reflects the social hierarchies of a given society.”[7]

The Next Step

In the next entry, I will explore the various moral positions of CRT.

[1] Richard Delgado and Jean Stefancic, Critical Race Theory: An Introduction, 3rd ed. (New York: New York University Press, 2017), 175.

[2] J. P. Moreland and William Lane Craig, Philosophical Foundations for a Christian Worldview (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2003), 218.

[3] Andrew Fagan, “Theodor Adorno,” Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, https://www.iep.utm.edu/adorno/, accessed July 11, 2019.

[4] While I was a graduate student in the University of Southern California’s School of Religion, several fellow students were ex-Catholics who were angry that the Church’s hierarchy defined what is “natural,” especially sexually, for them by appealing to natural law and essential natures.

[5] See Max Horkheimer, Critical Theory (Repr.; New York, NY: Continuum, 1982), 24. In an effort to unify science and philosophy, Horkheimer endorses materialism.

[6] Herbert Marcuse, “Concept of Essence,” in Negations: Essays in Critical Theory (Boston: Beacon Press, 1968), 67.

[7] Özlem Sensoy and Robin DiAngelo, Is Everyone Really Equal? in Multicultural Education Series (2nd ed.; ed. James A. Banks; New York: Teachers College Press, 2017), 31. Though DiAngelo might be better classified as an “antiracist,” I include her here because she has embraced much of CRT.

Making Sense of Morality: Critical Theory Overview

Various ethical terms

Image by Mary Pahlke from Pixabay

Introduction

Naturalistic ethics remains a dominant moral approach in the west. But there are at least two other contemporary kinds of ethics. They are critical theory and its particular versions, as well as postmodernism. I will start with critical theory (CT), with a focus today on social justice. 

Overview of Critical Theory

Social justice has a long and venerable history, including efforts such as abolishing British and American slavery; caring for the vulnerable, such as the poor, widows, orphans, and minorities; and caring for the sick, such as through building hospitals. Today, however, there seems to be a “new kind” of social justice that focuses on issues such as (1) economic justice through the redistribution of resources; (2) freedom from discrimination due to one’s gender identity, and to be given positive rights on that basis; (3) environmental justice; and (4) racism and reparations.

Often, these contemporary efforts seem to be grounded in CT, which has a deep influence in the humanities, whether at secular or religious institutions. CT has spawned a number of specific studies, such as critical race, ethnic, legal, gender and queer, and cultural studies. It is having much influence in part because proponents are identifying some real injustices which should be addressed, such as racism, sexism, slavery, economic oppression, mistreatment of women, etc.

Based on several key philosophical positions, and Marxist-inspired thought, CT began in the “Frankfurt school.” That school included several key thinkers, such as Max Horkheimer (d. 1973), Theodor Adorno (d. 1969), and Herbert Marcuse (d. 1979). CT also was influenced by Antonio Gramsci (d. 1937), and all four were influenced significantly by Karl Marx (d. 1883).

Three Key Positions

Some of the reasons for the influence of CT is that it taps into accepted views we have seen. First, it accepts materialism: reality is made of matter, without any essences. Second, everything is particular (nominalism). Third, in terms of knowledge, it accepts historicism.

Historicism is like the view we saw in Kant, that we cannot know reality as it is in itself (i.e., directly). CT rejects knowledge of universal truths for all people at all times and places, for that would require a universal standpoint. Instead, historicists believe all knowledge is situated: it is socially-based and embedded in a given historical location and time. Our situatedness shapes how we interpret reality, and, like a set of lenses, we always experience and interpret reality through that interpretive framework. Yet, we cannot take off our glasses and get a direct, uninterpreted gaze into reality itself. Everything is our interpretation, drawn from our particular historical location.

Nietzsche (d. 1900) helped give rise to historicism, too. As a naturalist, he denied any essences. Also, due to nominalism, there are no literal identities between any two things; we construct things by taking them to be identical. Unlike Kant, there are no truths of reason (a priori). Indeed, things like the will are just words, the way we happen to talk. Even that we are the subjects of our thoughts is just an interpretation according to our grammatical formulae. Our teaching how to use words deceives us to think such things are real. Indeed, claims to know what is real just reflect our will to power, when actually all knowledge is perspectival.

Ethics 

Now, CT posits that there are two groups, the oppressors and the oppressed. A critical theory seeks to liberate people from domination and oppression and increase freedom in all their forms. Ethically, our fundamental duty is to liberate the oppressed. That is done by leveling power and redistributing resources (i.e., material solutions, since matter is what is real). This means an equality ofoutcomes, notopportunity.

Moreover, traditional western societies’ institutions oppress and alienate people from their true selves by disrespect, disapproval, and social inequalities. Instead, people are to be free to live as they want (e.g., define their own sexuality). For secular critical theorists, this liberation is accomplished in part by the state’s coercive power.

For Further Reading

Max Horkheimer, Critical Theory

Friedrich Nietzsche, “Life, Knowledge, and Self-Consciousness,” and “Prejudices of Philosophers,” in Nineteenth-Century Philosophy, ed. Patrick Gardiner

Roger Scruton, Fools, Frauds and Firebrands: Thinkers of the New Left