In Charlottesville, Virginia, a crowd of angry protesters marched on August 12 in a manner reminiscent of Nazi paramilitary gatherings. Most of them were white men protesting the removal of iconic statues of generals from the American Civil War who fought to preserve slavery. Their appearance mimicked the famed Ku Klux Klan mobs united in their desire to keep black Americans in their place through violence and intimidation. Their anger escalated to encompass Jews and immigrants through chants like, “Jews shall not replace us,” and “Blood and Soil” (a popular Nazi slogan). A member of this angry community drove his car into a group of peaceful counter-demonstrators and killed a young woman. Events in Charlottesville saddened America, but what shocked it was President Donald Trump’s refusal to criticise this collection of Ku Klux Klan and neo-Nazi groups. He continues to equate these groups inciting angry white men with peaceful counter-demonstrators, and blames them both equally.
Echo from Charlottesville
Contrasting this chilling march dominated by white men in Charlottesville with the euphoric multi-colour crowd celebrating the election of America’s first African-American President eight years ago, one wonders what changed in the intervening eight years to allow hate and intolerance to replace hope and optimism for a multiracial society. Could it be that in an era of rising economic instability, the election of Barack Obama to America’s highest office created an impression that African-Americans were catching up with and perhaps surpassing white Americans in income and achievement, fuelling white resentment?
Statistical data from a 2016 survey conducted by the PEW Research Center sheds light on some of these trends. First, it documents a sharp fissure in American society between black and white Americans. The income gap between the two groups remains large. Median adjusted household income in 2014 terms was $24,700 and $44,700 for black and white households, respectively, in 1967. In 2015, incomes for both groups had grown, reaching $43,300 and $77,900, respectively for black and white households.
In absolute terms, this represents a growing gap between the two groups. Gap in wealth is even greater; today a median white household has 13 times the wealth of a median black household. These material differences spill over into perceptions with 88% of blacks saying more needs to be done to bridge the racial divide while only 53% of whites say so. Moreover, a far greater proportion of the black population feels that blacks are treated unfairly by police (74%) than white (35%).
However, if these data show a sharp racial divide in material and psychological well-being, they also show that a substantial proportion of white America recognises the vulnerabilities faced by their black brothers and sisters. Then what encourages these brazen displays of racism? Don’t these angry mobs know that they are in the minority in a public culture that embraces multiculturalism? The answer to this lies in the deep economic and cultural divide within white Americans.
A growing inequality
Wealth inequality in the U.S. has grown sharply over the past three decades, as estimated by the U.S. Federal Reserve Bank. In real terms, the bottom 20th percentile of white Americans had net average wealth of $15,248 over the period 1992-98, and $19,650 in 2001-07. But post-recession, it fell sharply to $10,468 in 2010-13. In contrast, the wealth of the top 10% of white Americans was $730,350, $1,210,554 and $1,260,430 in 1992-98, 2001-07 and 2010-13, respectively. Thus, while the bottom fifth bore the brunt of the recession of 2008, the top tenth have not suffered much, increasing the 90th/20th wealth ratio to 123 in recent years, compared to 48 two decades ago. Education and wealth accumulation go hand in hand with the college-educated owning most of the nation’s wealth. However, only 38% of white adults and 23% of black adults have a college degree. The PEW study also found that college-educated whites are far more likely to recognise their racial advantages than those with only high school education — 47% vs 17%.
Thus, it is not surprising that white households in lower income groups, most of whom lack college education, are resentful of their economic misfortune. In African-Americans and immigrants, they have found a handy target, with a healthy dose of anti-Semitism thrown in. While racial inequality in incomes has grown at the top and the middle of the distribution, that at the bottom has declined. Poverty rate among whites has grown from 8% to 10% between 1974 and 2014, while that for blacks has dropped from 30% to 26% over the same period. African-Americans are still more likely to be poor than the white population, but in this war of perceptions, poor whites feel that their conditions are deteriorating while those of African-Americans are improving.
What is surprising is that this frustrated and vulnerable group has found an unlikely ally in President Trump. One would normally not expect a billionaire business owner to tap into this well of discontent among the nation’s dispossessed. Yet, as unlikely as it seems, Republican voters seem far more discontent with what they perceive as minority appeasement than Democrats. The PEW study found that 59% of Republican voters believe that there is too much attention to racial issues in America compared to 21% of Democrats. Thus, Mr. Trump was clearly responding to his core voters when he refused to condemn the racist fringe elements that caused the Charlottesville tragedy.
However, a robust civil society rebuke from highly unlikely sources that has condemned both the Charlottesville violence and Mr. Trump’s morally bankrupt response to it gives cause for optimism about the strengths of American civil society. In the wake of Mr. Trump’s equivocation, eight leaders of major companies and business groups resigned from the President’s Manufacturing Council, beginning with Ken Frazier, the African-American CEO of Merck Pharmaceuticals, followed by CEOs of Under Armour and Intel among others. This led to the President disbanding the Manufacturing Council. Similar condemnation has poured in from artists and intellectuals, resulting in Donald and Melania Trump’s decision not to attend Kennedy Center awards ceremony, only the fourth time a sitting President has skipped these honours in four decades. Most importantly, even Republican legislators find themselves at odds with the President on this issue and some have publicly distanced themselves.
There is something about events like Charlottesville that throw the national character in sharp relief, highlighting both the forces that underpin these eruptions and the strength as well as weakness of the civil society. This past week has been full of the saddest and the proudest moments in recent American history. A President from the party of Lincoln who has lost the moral authority to lead the nation is confronted with an unlikely opposition. Who would have thought that corporate America would one day provide moral leadership where politicians fail?
Corporates take the lead
It would be a mistake for us to not recognise that this revolt began with the courageous leadership of a single individual, Ken Frazier of Merck. It seems likely that Mr. Frazier’s black conscience did not allow him to share a podium with Mr. Trump, but it also seems likely that on the whole, corporate America is responding to its stockholders and, to some extent, consumers, who do not want the nation’s political and economic agenda overshadowed by racial bigotry. As modern America faces up to its underbelly full of racism and hate, it is heartening to see that a vast majority of Americans refuse to be complicit in actions that shame its ideals.
Sonalde Desai is Professor of Sociology at University of Maryland and Senior Fellow at NCAER. The views expressed are personal
