BEYOND THE UNITED STATES: THE COMPARATIVE PERSPECTIVE

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BEYOND THE UNITED STATES THE COMPARATIVE
PERSPECTIVE

• CHAPTER 16

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The comparative Perspective

• Phenomenon of subordination based on race,
  nationality, or religion not unique to US occurs
  throughout the world
• Mexico
• Women and Mayans given second-class status
• Canada
• Faces racial, linguistic, and tribal issues
• Brazil
• Recognizing long history of racial inequality
• Israel
• Struggle of territory and autonomy between Jews
  and Palestinians
• Republic of South Africa
• Legacy of apartheid dominates present and future

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• World Systems Theory
• Considers the global economic system as divided
  between nations that control wealth and those
  that provide natural resources and labor
• Ethnonational Conflict
• Refers to conflicts between ethnic, racial,
  religious, and linguistic groups within nations
• Sociological perspective on relations between
  dominant and subordinate groups treats race and
  ethnicity as social categories
• Can be understood only in the context of shared
  meanings attached by societies and their members

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Mexico

• A nation of 108 million people
• The Mexican Indian people and the Color Gradient
• Color Gradient
• The placement of people on a continuum from light
  to dark skin color rather than in distinct racial
  groupings by skin color
• Another example of the social construction of
  race in which social class in linked to the
  social reality (or at least the appearance) of
  social purity

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• The Status of Women
• Gender stratification is an issue US shares with
  almost all other countries
• 1975, Mexico City site of first UN conference on
  the status of women
• Focused on the situation of women in developing
  countries
• Mexican women
• Often viewed as the ideal workers
• Have begun to address economic, political, and
  health issues
• Mexico beginning to realize issues social
  inequity extends beyond poverty

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Canada

• Multiculturalism adopted as a state policy for
  more than two decades
• The First Nation
• Aboriginal minorities largely consists of four
  groups
• 1. Status Indians members of 604 tribes
  officially recognized by the government.
• 2. Inuit living in Northern Canada
• 3. Métis of mixed ancestry
• 4. Non-status Indians

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• 1982 Canadian Federal Constitution
• Recognized and affirmed existing aboriginal and
  treaty rights of Canadian Native American, Inuit,
  and Métis people
• Defeat of the Charlottetown Agreement of 1992
• Embraced number of issues including greater
  recognition of Aboriginal people
• Social and economical fate of Aboriginal People
• Only 40 graduate from high school compared to
  70 of nation as a whole
• Unemployment twice as high and average income
  one-third lower

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• The Québécois
• French speaking people of the province of Quebec
• Quebec accounts for 1/4th of nations population
  and wealth
• Meech Lake Accords (1987)
• Failed constitutional amendments that would
  recognize Quebec as a distinct society
• 50.5 prefer to remain with Canada rather than
  become a separate nation
• Inter ethnic and linguistic conflict between the
  Anglophones and Francophones.

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• Immigration and Race
• Proportionate to its population, Canada receives
  consistently the most immigrants of any nation
• Over 18 of population foreign born
• Visible Minorities
• Persons other than Aboriginal or First Nation
  people who are non-White in racial background
• Accounts for 13.4 of the population
• Canadian immigration policy has alternated
  between being open and restrictive
• Growth in Asian, Black, and West Indian immigrants

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Brazil Not A Racial Paradise

• Brazil and US familiar in number of ways
• Colonized by Europeans who overwhelmed natives
• Imported Black Africans as slaves
• Treatment of indigenous people
• Legacy of Slavery
• Depended on slave trade more than US
• Easier to recognize African culture among Brazil
  Blacks than African Americans
• Contributions of African people kept alive in
  schools
• Surviving African culture overwhelmed by dominant
  European traditions, like US

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• Manumission
• Freeing of slaves
• For every 1,000 slaves, 100 freed annually
  compared to 4 per year in US
• Most significant difference between slavery in
  Southern US and Brazil
• Needed as crafts workers, shopkeepers, and
  boatmen, not just agricultural workers like in
  the US
• In Brazil, race not seen as measure of
  inferiority like US
• In Brazil, you were inferior if you were a slave
• In US, you were inferior if you were Black

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• The Racial Democracy Illusion
• Historian Carl Degler (1971)
• Mulatto Escape Hatch
• The key to differences in Brazilian and American
  race relations
• Mulatto or moreno (brown) recognized as group
  separate from either brancos (Whites) or pretos
  (Blacks)
• In US, mulattos classed with Blacks
• Escape hatch is an illusion
• Economically, fare marginally better than Black
  Brazilians or Afro-Brazilians
• Blacks with highest level of education and
  occupation experience most discrimination in
  terms of jobs, mobility, and income

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• 1/4th of all marriages between people of
  different color groupings
• Marriage between opposite ends of color gradient
  are uncommon
• Absence of direct racial confrontation and mixed
  marriages led to conclusion of Brazil as racial
  paradise
• Lack of racial tension does not mean prejudice
  does not exist
• Light skin color enhances status but impact is
  exaggerated
• People of mixed ancestry earn 12 more than
  Blacks but Whites earn another 26 more than
  moreno

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• Brazilian Dilemma
• Gradual recognition racial prejudice and
  discrimination exist
• 20th century, changed from nation prided on
  freedom from racial intolerance to country
  legally attacking discrimination
• Alfonso Arinos Law (1951)
• Prohibiting racial discrimination in public place
• No use overturning subtle forms of discrimination
• Women of color fare poorly in Brazil
• Geledes/SOS Racism
• Black rights group
• Challenge in organizing is that Afro-Brazilians
  fail to recognize discrimination

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Israel and the Palestinians

• Diaspora
• Exile of Jews from Palestine over 2,000 years ago
• British colonialism during World War I and the
  Middle East
• British endorsement of a Jewish national homeland
  in Palestine
• Spirit of Zionism
• Yearning to establish a Jewish state in the
  biblical homeland
• To Arabs, meant subjugation and elimination of
  Palestinians

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• Arab-Israeli Conflicts
• No sooner had Israel recognized, Arab nations
  announced intention to restore control to
  Palestine
• Egypt, Jordan, Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon
• By force if necessary
• Six-Day War (1967)
• Syrias response to Israels military actions to
  take surrounding territory
• Yom Kippur War (October 1973)
• Launched against Israel by Egypt and Syria
• Lead to huge oil price increases as retaliation
• President Carters mediation and Egypts
  recognition of Israels right to exist

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• The Intifada
• Began in December 1987
• Uprising against Israel by Palestinians in
  occupied territories through attacks, boycott,
  strikes, resistance, and noncooperation
• Grassroots movement of students, workers, unions,
  professionals, and business leaders
• Used television to transform world opinion,
  especially US
• Palestinians came to be viewed as people
  struggling for self-determination rather than
  terrorists
• Diaspora of Jews led to displacement of
  Palestinian Arabs

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• The Search for Solutions Amid Violence
• Oslo Accords (1993)
• Agreements between Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak
  Rabin and PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat for creation
  of first self-governing Palestinian territory in
  Gaza Strip and West Bank
• Issues of lasting peace
• Future of Jewish settlements in Palestinian
  territories
• Future of Arabs with Israeli citizenship
• Creation of independent Palestinian national
  state
• Israel-Palestinian Authority relations with
  government under control of Hamas, sworn to
  Israels destruction
• Future of Palestinian refugees elsewher

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Republic of South Africa

• Different from rest of Africa because original
  African people of area no longer present
• Largest group are Black Africans
• Coloured (Cape Coloureds) and Asians make up
  remaining non-Whites
• Small White community
• English
• Afrikaners
• Descended from Dutch and other European settlers

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• The Legacy of Colonialism
• Settlement of South Africa by Europeans began in
  1652
• Dutch East Indian Company colony in Cape Town
• Dutch slave owners and trek inwards
• Acquisition of parts of South Africa by Britain
  in 1814
• British and Indian immigration
• British and Boer wars
• British freed Blacks and gave them almost all
  political and civil rights
• Pass Laws
• Curfews placed on Bantus (Blacks) limiting
  geographic movement and enforced through 1986

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• Apartheid
• Means separation or apartness in Afrikans
• British colonial rule ended with independence in
  1948
• Afrikaners assumed control of government
• White supremacy became formalized into law
• Apartheid was 20th century effort to reestablish
  master-slave relationship
• Blacks could not vote
• Could not move through country freely
• Unable to hold jobs without government approval
• To work at approved jobs, forced to live in
  temporary quarters far from real homes
• Access to health care, education, and social
  services severely limited

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• 1990, South African Prime Minister F. W. DeKlerk
• Legalized 60 banned Black organizations
• Freed Nelson Mandela, Leader of African National
  Congress after 27 years of imprisonment
• National Peace Accord
• Signed by DeKlerk and Black leaders pledging
  establishment of multiparity democracy to end
  violence
• 1992 referendum allowing Whites to vote on ending
  apartheid
• 68.6 in favor of continued dismantling of legal
  apartheid and creation of new constitution
• DeKlerk and Mandela jointly awarded Nobel Peace
  Prize in 1993

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• The Era of Reconciliation and Moving On
• April 1994, Mandelas ANC received 62 of vote
  giving him 5 year term as president
• Truth and Reconciliation Commission
• People allowed to come forward and confess
  horrors committed under apartheid
• If judged remorseful (most were), not subject to
  prosecution if failed to confess, were
  prosecuted
• Controversial issues facing ANC led government
  are familiar to US citizens
• Desperate poverty
• Affirmative Action and reverse apartheid
• Medical care (AIDS, 10 of population less than
  3 receiving medication
• Crime
• School integration

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• Most difficult is land reform
• Black South Africans forced from their land
  between 1960 and 1990
• 1994
• Government took steps to transfer 30 of
  agriculture land to Black South Africans
• Plans to restore original inhabitants to their
  land where feasible (just and equitable
  compensation)
• Issue more critical in view of South Africa
  hosting 2010 Football (Soccer) World Cup

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QUESTIONS
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• Identify who the native people are and what their
  role has been in each of the societies discussed
  in this chapter.

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• On what levels can one speak of an identity issue
  facing Canada as a nation?

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• What role has secession played in Canada and
  Israel?

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• How have civil uprisings affected intergroup
  tensions in Mexico and Israel?

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• To what extent are the problems facing South
  Africa today a part of apartheids legacy?

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• In what ways are South Africas policy of
  apartheid similar to the Jim Crow laws of the
  American South?

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• Social construction of race emphasizes how we
  create arbitrary definitions of skin color that
  then have social consequences. Drawing on the
  societies discussed, select one nation and
  identify how social definitions work in other
  ways to define group boundaries.