BY MALIK MIAH
SAN FRANCISCO — Here he goes again. University of California Regent Ward Connerly, a prominent African-American conservative and former benefactor of affirmative action programs, has submitted nearly one million voter signatures to state officials to place on the ballot a measure that would bar state and local governments from collecting race-based information.
Connerly was the author of the 1996 ballot initiative, Proposition 209, which dismantled affirmative action in California. He views the Racial Privacy Initiative (RPI) as an extension of his campaign to make California a legally "colour-blind" society. State officials say the initiative will either be on the November 2002 or the March 2003 ballot.
Connerly and Shelby Steele, a senior fellow at the Stanford University's Hoover Institution and another black conservative opposed to affirmative action, argue that collecting racial data promotes a mentality of "racial siege". "The government ought not to be profiling us", Connerly explains. "The government ought to be treating us as individuals."
An April Field Poll shows that the backers of the RPI have so far confused the public. By a nearly 3-to-2 ratio, voters favour the initiative. African Americans are evenly split, with whites and Latinos in favour by 33-50%. Asian Americans are against it by 35-42%.
Connerly is a master at turning reality upside down and playing on the desire of African Americans and other racial minorities seeking to "fit in" as "Americans" without facing racial discrimination. Most whites, who are not racist, likewise want "Americans" to be judged by "merit" and "ability".
Of course, the initiative is a scam and a fraud. Connerly and other backers have exemptions to their "colour blind" scheme. For example, the initiative will not apply to the police. Cops use racial profiling to target blacks and other minorities for arrests and prosecution. Middle Eastern and Arab peoples will be targeted to stop potential "terrorists".
Yet data that could be used to force government bodies to prevent discrimination and enforce civil rights laws would become illegal if the RPI becomes law in California. Federal laws would still apply but any attempt by the state government to promote "ethnic" heritage and culture (Cinco de Mayo, Asian-Pacific Heritage Month or Black History Month among others now celebrated) would be frowned upon if not seen as a violation of law.
This is a strange debate over race-based data. Historically, data was rarely collected since whites in power didn't need it. They could look at the colour of a person's skin to decide if they would be discriminated against or not. Whites controlled all the dominant social institutions, and simply chose their own for college admissions and corporate hiring.
What changed this reality was the powerful civil rights movement after the second world war. That movement (a domestic manifestation of the worldwide anti-colonial struggles in Asia and Africa) ended legal segregation and opened the door to affirmative action and other socio-economic gains for blacks and other oppressed racial minorities.
It also led to a debate, begun by black conservatives in the 1980s and 1990s, who argued against the view that "race" was the primary cause for the second-class status of African Americans. Legal equality, in their view, put the onus on individuals not society.
The civil rights laws won in the 1960s, however, only weakened that domination of the rich white ruling class. It has been a long battle to get the data collected to prove both intentional and covert discrimination.
Although California is probably the most multiracial state, after Hawaii, it is not a colour-blind society at all. There is discrimination especially of the working poor who are black, Latino or Asian.
In fact, if race data collection becomes illegal in California, discrimination will rise since it will become harder to prove intentional discrimination.
This doesn't concern Connerly and many middle-class blacks because they falsely believe that discussing racism is a way for individuals not to take responsibility for their own actions. They call it a mentality of "racial siege" and permanent victimisation.
What the supporters of RPI have is a simplistic view of a "colour-blind" society. It can't simply be decreed. The basis of racism is powerful economic interests. Skin colour is still a huge factor in how people are treated no matter their social class. It is not an accident that blacks with identical educational and income qualifications as whites pay more on average for loans and other services. The fact that some blacks can live a "good" middle class life doesn't alter these facts.
The truth is most Americans don't support racial discrimination and don't like the fact it still exists. This is a significant change from the days of Jim Crow segregation, but to say so doesn't mean progress can't be eroded or reversed.
One novel argument of the RPI backers is that California is already on its way to becoming a truly multi-racial society so racial data isn't needed. M. Royce Van Tassell, a former director of research for the misnamed American Civil Rights Institute, writes in an op ed piece in the San Francisco Chronicle, "Racial privacy will happen regardless of what happens at the polls. Whether the initiative is passed this fall or not, its practical effects are inevitable."
But that's exactly why racial data collection is needed. When whites become a minority in California people of colour won't wield political and economic power. Economic levers remain in the hands of rich whites. And no group ever in history has given up its economic domination unless forced to do so.
The only way to see how progress is being made in ending legal and de facto discrimination in government and other aspects of society is by objective statistics. Without a scientific method of measurement, we won't know if the cops have stopped racial profiling and if governments and corporations are living up to the laws against discrimination.
What's ironic is that President George Bush and others in high office are opposed to using such blatant "wedge politics" to advance their right-wing agenda. There's no need to do so yet, since there's no organised mass opposition to the Democratic and Republican parties that presently run the federal government.
Moreover, there continues to be a steady impoverishment of the working poor. There is no need for the US capitalist rulers to whip up racial hatred today. The US ruling elite has become more racially integrated to the point that blatant race bashing is not necessary as a policy.
Even after September 11, the Bush administration only backed selective targeting of alleged Middle Eastern "terrorists". It opposed active discrimination against Muslims and Arabs as a group.
At the same time, the rightist social agenda of the federal government encourages conservatives to go further than what's advocated by those in power in Washington. Thus we have the Connerly initiative even though the Republican Party leadership in California so far is uneasy about promoting the RPI.
Unless there is a serious counter campaign against the RPI, it will be adopted as law. So far the unions, civil rights organisations and others opposed to such "wedge politics" have simply hoped it would go away.
From Green Left Weekly, June 19, 2002.
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