LET’S AT LEAST GET THE DEFINITION
RIGHT
Like a raging wildfire, angst about critical race theory (CRT) has swept across the American
political landscape in 2021. Everybody’s talking about something most just heard of recently. Nationally syndicated
columnist Leonard Pitts, who contends he’s “forgotten more
about race than most people have ever So, what’s going on?
Why the phobia among state legislators, school board members, U.S.
Senators, and ordinary citizens? WHAT IS CRT? We’ve studied it, read books and articles
about it, and discussed it with academics and other professionals interested in
the subject. We also understand the cynical exploitation of an obscure academic
concept for political gain. In this and our next post, we’ll unpack the
definition of CRT and how it’s been misused.
The History Lesson
CRT didn’t magically appear from thin
air. It originated in the mid-1980s. It’s a way
academics, most of them law
professors, talk to each other about race and its interface with law and
culture. It’s not the language of the streets or even the kitchen table. Right
wing politicians and others with an agenda use it as if it were.
In the words of one of its founders, CRT is “a body of legal
scholarship… [developed by theorists] ideologically committed to the struggle
against racism, particularly as institutionalized
in and by law.” Derrick Bell (1930 - 2011) offered that in a 1995 University of Illinois Law Review article titled “Who’s Afraid
of Critical Race Theory?” Professor Bell identified himself
and four others (Richard Delgado, Charles Lawrence, Mari Matsuda, and Patricia
Williams) as CRT’s “founding members.”
We believe it appropriate that we look to Professor Bell’s
article and other works by those founding members in defining CRT. We’ve discovered
that even we disagree about the proper interpretation of their definitions. This post explores our differences. We agree, however, about how the right has
misused CRT in sparking fear and mistrust among Americans, most of them white,
for political gain. We’ll explore that next time.
The Definitional
Disagreement
collaborated in 2017 on Critical Race Theory: An Introduction, 3rd ed. They defined CRT as a movement by “a collection of activists and scholars
engaged in studying and transforming the relationship among race, racism, and
power.” This sounds like Professor Bell’s 1995 definition. Delgado and
Stefanic added, however, that CRT “questions
the very foundation of the liberal order, including equality theory, legal
reasoning, Enlightenment rationalism, and neutral principles of constitutional
law.” In discussing CRT, Rob and Henry, for slightly different
reasons, have vigorously supported the idea the Delgado/Stefancic addition
constitutes an indispensable element in CRT’s definition. Rob asserts that his
review of Professor Bell’s work, particularly his books
And We Are Not Saved: The Elusive Quest for Racial Justice and Faces at the Bottom of the Well: The Permanence of Racism, provide graphic examples of the kind of
explorations of racially-tinged legal issues encompassed in the
Delgado/Stefancic addition. Henry, relying on his judicial experience, sees
their formulation as essential to any practical application of CRT in the legal
process.
Woodson notes, however, that Professor Bell didn’t include
the Delgado/Stefancic addition in that seminal Illinois Law Review article. Because of his prominence in developing CRT,
Woodson thinks if he’d wanted to include that, he would have. As importantly, Woodson sees
opportunities for mischief in the
Delgado/Stefancic addition. To the uninitiated, arguably vague terms like
“Enlightenment rationalism” and “neutral principles of constitutional law”
leave running room for misguided claims about CRT that have emerged in the
current debate.
CRT
represents a “poison” that could destroy American civilization. Mark Levin, an assertive proponent of laws that keep CRT out of
classrooms, has argued it could “destroy the
existing society.” No basis exists
for such ideas, but definitions matter. Good reasons abound for being careful
about those that open the door for disinformation.
The Big Six
Beyond the definitional debate, we think CRToffers useful
ideas for exploring and understanding racism and its impact on legal
norms. We need creative ways of studying
racial issues. No matter how the right twists itself into a pretzel in
distorting CRT, its basic tenets remain useful for an important endeavor
America still must undertake:
·
Racism
is ordinary, not aberrational;
·
white
over color serves important psychic and material purposes for the dominant
group;
·
as
a matter of social construction, race and races are products of social thought
and relations;
·
how
a dominant society racializes minority groups differs and depends on shifting
needs, such as labor markets;
·
in
terms of intersectionality and anti-essentialism, each race has its own origins
and ever evolving history; and
·
the
voice of color exists because it’s unlikely whites can convey the history and
experiences of people of color.
Hardly any elementary or secondary schools now teach CRT. No reason
exists for fears about school children being indoctrinated to “hate America,”
as some have claimed. Misuse of CRT, as columnist Pitts suggested, developed
from those who “fear nothing quite so much as the loss of whiteness and its
privileges.”
What if students explored America’s racial past
guided, in part, by CRT’s six ideas? Would the world end if pupils studied
slavery, Jim Crow, income inequality, and criminal justice inequity with these principles in mind? Of course not!
We
think it more likely all ethnic groups would
come to grips with the negative effects of racism on American laws and norms,
resulting in a more sensitive, just, and egalitarian society.
country on the “verge of a national nervous breakdown” because of Vietnam
and racial turmoil. Perhaps we’re not there now, but disarray abounds. Many
supporters of former President Donald
Trump appear willing to abandon democratic norms and
institutions so he can wield power again. 
