A Colorblind Society Will Not Work free essay sample

In his I have a Dream Speech, a statement which stands out in everybodys mind is To be judged not by the color our of skin but for the content of our character (King, 1963), he implements the idea of racial equality, but realizes racial identity will cease to exist. Another problem of the Color Blind Society is forgetting that one of the many ways people identify themselves is by race. To be blind to this fact is to ignore an obvious racial or ethnic identity. Nonetheless to ignore this facet of a color-blinding a society is to abandoned ones heritage and roots, despite what ethnic group minority or majority one belongs to. This suggestion of a color-blind society is far fetched and nearly accepts the idea of not acknowledging racism to exist among minorities. Dr. Kings thoughts of racial equality might have been taken out of context. Even though he mentions for his fellow brothers and sisters to be judged on their character and not color, he is not implying he wanted his Black brothers and sisters to forget and ignore who they are. We will write a custom essay sample on A Colorblind Society Will Not Work or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page He recognized the significance of the being disadvantaged as a Black American. In his Letter from Birmingham Jail, he makes reference to the Negros problem in communities and the segregation in the city of Birmingham. He expresses his concerns of how their homes and churches are the target of more racially motivated crimes in Birmingham than any other city in the U. S. His movement was not for a color-blind society, but wanted to propose the advancement of Blacks on the basis of who they are internally and not on the surface. The reality of skin color is knowing that color does exists, he sought out to implement the use of judging beyond ones outward appearance alone. He proposed not to advocate violence and rightfully expressed his views stating We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed (King, 1963). This powerful statement shows his recognition for oppression existing and demanded for its justice. With his views on an equal society and request for fairness with Blacks, these concepts have still followed suit long after his untimely death, however the racial problem continues to thrive in Americas forefront (King, 1963). With every other television or newspaper headline starting out identifying people especially criminals by their race first, there is no way to diminish the profile of an individuals color. Whether they are Black, White, Asian, or Hispanic the first few words described of a person in is their race or cultural background. This is just one of the ways the minorities, particularly Blacks have been attributed as to being recognized for color first; more so their color, plus what they did or did not achieve. Furthermore, many firsts have been congratulated as well as widely accepted on the account for positive movements within their culture. For example a Black woman being the first to serve in the White House cabinet, an Asian being the first to receive a doctorate, or the first Hispanic owned million dollar business. To free our society of these recognitions is to deny these individuals admiration for opening the doors of others to achieve the same aspirations in life. The root of existing racism resides within the practices of stereotypes. Stereotypes have been formed over many years by using a fact or the truth and distorting its ideas in a demeaning way to generalize others. As long as stereotypes exists then racism will continue, and as long as racism continues there can never be a color-blind society. Stereotyped views remain by the use of the oppressors as a way of not having to educate or acknowledge how the effects of racism have altered the state of minorities socially, economically, and psychologically. For some, it is easy to hold on to stereotypes rather than invite the blame of the oppressor. For this reason, there is a misunderstanding of blame and oppression. While forceful segregation has not remained distinct, there continues to be a problem with institutional racism in the schools, communities, workforce, and jail systems. Schools are affected by the communities which separate districts a majority of the time by race. When urban communities are left behind from prosperous industries, the people are often left jobless and in poverty. Job markets often look for an ideal candidate. Many wish to hire workers who would appeal to the other workers including the clientele and consuming industry. Unfortunately it might be seen as uninviting to look a certain way, talk different, or dress within a different class. Employers may hold a higher standard of physical appearance and socio-economical background when choosing employees. There is no mistake that the prisons are heavily populated with more minorities as with non-minorities. There is an unjust system of profiling and unfairness standing in the government scope. A color-blind society will not be able to exist with unfair treatment of minorities. Howard Witt reported in the Chicago Tribune of a 14 year old Black girl who was sentenced for up to 7 years for shoving a hall monitor in Paris, Texas. Brenda Cherry who is an activists states the small town of 26,000 is segregated and she informs how she can still see the Paris Fairgrounds, which was the site of various lynches in the late 1800s to the early 1900s. She makes a comparison to the July 2006 criminal conviction of a 19 year White man who was held responsible in a homicide which killed a 54 year old Black woman along with her 3 year old grandson with his truck (Witt, 2007). There are too many factors in creating a color-blind society. There are existing problems within every sector of racism. Adopting the idea of a color-blind society is procreating just what is says, and that is covering the notion that racism exists and skin color is not going to be recognized. Blinding the world to what is essentially reality; suggests the unimportance of accepting an equal racial society. A number of efforts have been enforced by the civil rights movement, activists, and community leaders to strive for equality and continued freedom, and to deny them of this endeavor is to not only regress but would promote that minority’s concerns have no relevance to their society. Minorities have been taught to ignore, be inferior and stand and wait like Dr. King said, but no one will grant them their freedom, it has to be demanded. A color-blind society perpetuates the idea of blinding racism. This is a myth which may never be possible considering the long history of oppression that has affected the minorities in the United States.

The hegemonic decline of the United States and the eastward shift in the global capitalist economy The WritePass Journal

The hegemonic decline of the United States and the eastward shift in the global capitalist economy Abstract The hegemonic decline of the United States and the eastward shift in the global capitalist economy : 33) In turn, this will end up hurting the most powerful sovereign nation, which will find it increasingly difficult to maintain military hegemony without the ability to print out as many dollars as it needs. The erosion of political sovereignty as a result of the Great Recession of 2008 and the reaction to it by the ‘Second World’ goes hand in hand with the idea of privatisation of economic power, managed at supranational and extraterritorial level by powerful private concerns (Khanna, 2008: 41). These supranational concerns are in the process of setting up their own regulatory schemes, imposed on individual territorial states, which are finding it increasingly difficult to resist them. My preliminary findings show that the realignment of economic international systems is the main conduit by which harmonisation leading to an hegemonic shift in favour of China will be activated. In addition, there is a definite reaction by what I would call the Shanghai Cooperation Orga nisation bloc (notably China and Russia, but also the likes of India and Iran). The harmonisation process is proceeding apace in the West. This reaction in the Second World is generating its own kind of harmonisation. The political sovereignty of nations could also be further impaired by the conflict that will arise as a result of it. Trying to eliminate the logic of anarchy brings with it the possibility of conflict. As Schmitt put it, the political cannot exist outside the realm of conflict. It is expected that the United States will not let China accumulate the necessary military capabilities in order to establish itself as the new hegemon. Preliminary findings There are several factors which enables us to think that a hegemonic transition is taking place. A massive, imposing display of Chinese-constructed fighter aircraft and other military equipment was used to commemorate the 60th anniversary of communist Chinas founding, on 1 October, 2009. At the same time, Chinas space industry was rapidly burgeoning and continuing to develop. Along with the fact that the Chinese economy continued to expand during a global recession and a rising position on the world political stage, these technological advances indicate Chinas movement towards the status of a world superpower. While the rest of the world struggled in 2009, the Chinese economy exemplified a remarkable flexibility in returning to significant growth. The Chinese government attributes this economic resilience to Chinas blend of communism with capitalism, in contrast to the laissez-faire approach taken by the West (Guthrie, 1999: 122). In early 2009, a migration of millions of workers from urban areas to rural locales resulted from the closure of factories that produced exports on the east coast and south coast of China. The steep price of fuel and food had put pressure on household budgets in 2008, and in order to halt inflation, stringent financial and credit policies were set in place. These policies caused the construction industry to dip, as well as a slump in the property market. In response, the Chinese government created a stimulus package in November 2008 that was worth 4 trillion yuan (about $586 billion). Approximately 50% of the stimulus package was set aside for improving infrastructure, such as railways and airports, primarily in rural regions, while a further 25% was designated for the Sichuan province, which had been severely affected by a May 2008 earthquake and was in need of rebuilding. Banks were ordered to increase lending, and the result was a 164% upsurge of loans in the first three quarters of 2009. This facilitated a rebound of the economy, which occurred far more quickly than in other countries. (Wright, 2010: 221). Additionally, the latter part of the year saw the recovery of exports, which set China up to overtake Germany as the top exporter world-wide. As a result, speculation grew as to whether China could reclaim the dominant position that it once held prior to the early 1800s, at which time it provided roughly one third of manufacturing in the world, compared to just 25% of manufacturing in the West. This outcome was rendered more probably by a trade deal with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations that transpired at the end of the year. As the worlds largest creditor, China had a symbiotic and mutually beneficial relationship with the U.S., the globes biggest debtor, that had become vital in the effort to rebalance the global economy. Zhou Xiaochuan, governor of the Peoples Bank of China (PBOC) issued a statement on 23 March 2009 that called for an interna tional currency that would replace the U.S. dollar as the primary global currency and would remain unattached to individual countries; he argued that this currency would have increased stability over time. The Peoples Bank of China also proposed that Special Drawing Rights, which were designed in 1969 by the IMF for utilisation between international institutions and governments, might be employed on a wider scale and used as payment in international finance and trade transactions. This would reduce fluctuations in price and the risks associated with these fluctuations. The initiative was made again at the yearly Group of Eight (G-8) summit that took place in Italy in July 2009. Delegates from China, India, Brazil, Mexico, and South Africa (also known as the Group of Five) were also invited to the summit, where China, along with India and Russia (a G-8 member) called for an overhaul of the global financial system and a halt to dollar domination. In the latter part of September 2009, the president of the World Bank, Robert Zoellick, cautioned that the U.S. dollar faced an increasing threat due to the rising force of both the euro and the Chinese yuan. At this juncture China had surpassed Japan as the main creditor of the U.S.; there were concerns coming from Beijing that the $800.5 billion value of U.S. Treasury securities, along with other assets that constituted 60% of Chinas foreign-exchange reserves and 30% of foreign-exchange reserves globally, would be attenuated by American debt and decreasing confidence in the U.S. dollar. Â  China presented a temporary solution, which was to resist purchasing U.S. Treasury stock and, more significantly, to advocate the utilisation of the yuan as a world currency. (Kim, 2010: 49). Bibliography Arrighi, G., Capitalism and the Modern World-System: Rethinking the Non-debates of the 1970s Review (Fernand Braudel Center), Vol. 21, No. 1 (1998), pp. 113-129 Arrighi, G. The Three Hegemonies of Historical Capitalism, Review (Fernand Braudel Center), Volume 13, Number 3 (Summer, 1990), pp. 365-408 Basch, L. et al (1993) Nations Unbound: Transnational Projects, Postcolonial Predicaments, and Deterritorialized Nation-States, Gordon and Breach, London Bobbitt, Philip (2002) The Shield of Achilles: War, Peace and the Course of History. New York, Alfred Knopf Bryson, J. Nick, H., Keebie, D. and Martin, R. (1999) The Economic Geography Reader: Producing and Consuming Global Capitalism, Wiley, New York Dilly, R. 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(2001) The Sixteen-Trillion-Dollar Mistake: How the U.S. Bungled Its National Priorities from the New Deal to the Present, Columbia University Press, New York Khanna, P. (2008) The Second World, Penguin Books, London Kim, Yong-Ki, The Rise of G20 and Koreas Response , SERI Quarterly. Volume: 3. Issue: 4 October 2010, pp. 49-66 Kindleberger, C. Dominance and Leadership in the International Economy, International Studies Quarterly 25(2) (1981), pp. 242-54 Mandel, E. (1995) Long Waves of Capitalist Development, Verso, London Marx, K. (1863) The Capital, Volume III, marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1894-c3/index.htm MCCarthy, G. (1990) Marx and the Ancients: Classical Ethics, Social Justice, and Nineteenth-Century Political Economy, Rowman and Littlefield, Savage, MD Organski, A.F.K. (1969) World Politics, Knopf, New York Suominen, K. (2012) Peerless and Periled: The Paradox of American Leadership in the World Economic Order, Stanford University Press, Stanford, CA Wright, T. (2010) Accepting Authoritarianism: State-Society Relations in Chinas Reform Era, Stanford University Press, Stanford, CA