Response-Pol-08

Response one –pol-8

Note_three or four references for your response

Herbert Hoover once stated, the business of America is business, and the best business practice would be to ensure that all its people have a chance to participate in the American Dream.  America’s business is the people’s business; full participation in the nation’s economic life, business, or government.  The American Dream consists of tenets about achieving success, about material well-being, religious freedoms, membership in elective office, and a successful family.  The American dream is being inclusiveness in the melting pot.  I remember “at least for me,” growing up in the deep south during the 60s and 70s.  As a young child our community was black, we shopped at black owned businesses, we ate dinner at black owned restaurants, we even went to drive-theaters in the mid-60s as a form of social entertainment.  I was old enough to remember when schools were first integrated due to the 1954 Supreme Court decision “separate but equal” being ruled unconstitutional.  If I can remember, so can a lot of others, and not just domestically.               The United States Constitution was written with a focus on race and gender.  The men who wrote the constitution were escaping persecution as well.  America was founded on race and gender issues, wars, aristocratic oppression, and religious persecutions.  They developed a government system for the people, and by the people.  Individuals we elect bring regional biases to the federal government.  They been adjudicating or legislating racism since the first congress convened.  Take the 13th Amendment, which abolished slavery and involuntary servitude, except as punishment for a crime, or the Civil Rights Act of 1866, which guaranteed citizens’ rights (only selected few) to make and enforce economic contracts, and to purchase, sell, or lease property.  Women were not even given a public voice either.  The 14th Amendment declared all persons born or naturalized in the U.S. to be citizens. The 15th Amendment forbade State’s to deprive their citizens of their right to vote because of race, color, or previous condition of servitude, and one last example, the “First Ku Klux Klan Act (Civil Rights Act of 1870), prohibited discrimination in voter registration based on race, color, or previous condition of servitude, etc.  Several States adopted Black Codes, and Jim Crow laws to suppress their minority populations.  Frozen in time, once proclaiming “I have a Dream” during his historic march on the nations capitol, Dr. Martin Luther King’s speech has been endlessly reproduced and selectively quoted over the years and, yet, his speeches retain their majesty of justice, but seem to have lost their political effectiveness over time.              Today, we hear very little of the King who believed that “the real racial issues in America were not regional ones like in the south, but a national one.” But America’s history teaches, that it was the States that resisted, not all, but some, States.  Gone is the King who attacked segregation in the North, when African Americans became internally displaced individuals fleeing the searing oppressions of the South.  Erased is the King who opposed the Vietnam War, and effectively linked racism domestically, to America’s military industrial complex abroad.  Gone is the King who advocated unionization, planned the poor peoples’ campaign, and was assassinated in 1968 while supporting a Sanitation Worker’s Strike (Hall, J.D., 2005).  Our history is filled with the struggles of federalism.  States’ rights opposition to equality of minorities despite the national effort to legislate race and gender inequality in a global world.   If all policies were fair, then economics would be fair.  By confining the civil rights struggle with a one month “label” out of twelve, or only to the ascription of black skin color, is to diminish its true narrative.  Racial capitalism has persisted for decades, and not just in an ethnic nature.  Physical segregation, and disenfranchisement also entails economic practices that specifically targeted groups and will continue to do so until capitalism is not racially motivated, like the current debate over immigration/migration.  The right balance in todays global environment is at the State level.  Federalism as we once knew it is out of balance because of foreign policies and national security interests.  Politics is conducted on the local, county, state, federal, and global level because of treaties with international governments and international organization like the World Trade Organization.      Bibliography: Featherstone, Lisa, 2002, Wal-Mart Values, The Nation,  http://www.thenation.com/article/wal-mart-values Harris, David, 2012, Flying While Arab: Lessons from Racial Profiling Controversy, Civil Rights Journal, vol.t, no. 1 pp.8-13, http://www.usccr.gov/pubs/crj/wint2002 Hochschild, J.L., 1995, Facing Up to the American Dream: Race, class and the Soul of the   Nation, Princeton University Press, pp. 15-38 http://history.house.gov/Exhibitions-and-Publications/BAIC/Historical-Data/Constitutional-Amendments-and-Legislation/

Response Two –Pol—08

United States politics are focused on race and gender because that is where the focus is in society. Historically, there has been a division of labor between men and women of all races as well as division between races. There have also been divisions among those groups. Herein lies the heart of the issue, our society focuses on them and us, me and you, members and non-members, instead of turning a lens toward what is similar and common and those priorities most people of all races and genders can agree on. American society has a tendency to get down into the depths of where there are inevitably going to be differences while if the focus comes at a higher level of such priorities that matter to all people, for example, priorities of taking care of children and elderly and ill members, providing a quality education for the children who are going to be responsible for society in the future. Until society can get to that point where groups are important but not as important as those shared priorities, American politics will not progress past divisiveness.

In an ideal world where gender and race do not play a part in scholarly endeavors, politics, journalism or any other area. However, this is not a perfect world and those divisions do exist. Sumner (2018) presents a web-based tool, the Gender Balance Assessment Tool (GBAT) that is meant to assess the balance of gender used in citations and courses to ensure a balance. Sumner focuses her critique of the lack of gender balance in the world of political science where women are used less in course syllabi and as sources in bibliographies (2018). This does not mean women do not know or work in political science, their presence is not as acknowledged as men.

Hamidullah and Riccucci (2016) discuss the balance of work and family life for women in the employ of the federal government as women continue to frequently be the primary caregivers for children and elderly parents. Their findings are quite exploratory, and the authors are reluctant to delve too deeply into the analysis of the data, however, the data does clearly provide the information that flexible family policies are a major factor in employee satisfaction (Hamidullah and Riccucci, 2016). Hennings and Urbatsch (2015) examine the differences between parties and the gender of lieutenant-governor candidates to a complex conclusion. Candidates are more likely to be women if the lieutenant-governor is appointed regardless of party but if the voters choose the lieutenant governor, Republicans are more likely to choose a male candidate (Hennings and Urbatsch, 2015). The voter is not trusted to set biases of gender in politics aside. Baitinger (2015) takes a different stance on gender in politics by examining the lack of women in political journalism. The realm of journalism should not be dependent upon gender but on who is capable of getting the best story (Baitinger, 2015). Again, is this inherent in journalism or is this based on the perception of society that women cannot get a quality political story?

Race neutrality would not make the polity more effective. Much like the statement “I’m colorblind”, not considering race at all in policy creation and implementation would be dismissive of a rather large piece of many people’s identity. There is nothing fair about a situation where race or gender is dismissed as both are necessary for writing a policy that encompasses the complex nature of the human identity.

As previously stated, a step in the direction of balance would be for federal law to focus on the high-level similarities among all people as mentioned above. State and local governments should get down into addressing the differences. The federal government should be taking a broad view of things as there are so many people under federal jurisdiction, but a one size fits all approach to addressing the differences between groups and among groups will not be satisfactory and is unlikely to yield true balance in the polity.

References

Baitinger, Gail. (2015). "Meet the Press or Meet the Men? Examining Women's Presence in American News Media." Political Research Quarterly 68(3): 579-92. http://www.jstor.org/stable/24637795.

Hamidullah, Madinah F. and Norma M. Riccucci. (2016). Intersectionality and family-friendly policies in the federal government: Perceptions of women of color. Administration and Society. 49(1): 105-120. doi: 10.1177/0095399715623314.

Hennings, Valerie M. and R. Urbatsch. (2016). Gender, partisanship, and candidate-selection mechanisms. State Politics & Policy Quarterly. 16(3): 290-312. doi: 10.1177/1532440015604921.

Sumner, Jane Lawrence. (2018). The gender balance assessment tool (GBAT): A web-based tool for estimating gender balance in syllabi and bibliographies. Political Science and Politics. 51(2). 396-400. doi:10.1017/S1049096517002074.

Response Three-pol-03

America is made up of many different races. But when a majority, in this case whites, feel threatened, they turn to tribalism and strengthen their loyalty to their group. In recent times this has led to “identity politics” where people of a particular religion, race, social background, etc., form exclusive political alliances, moving away from traditional broad-based party politics. One Oxford paper points out “Research also shows that, in comparison to majority populations, members of ethnic minorities are generally less active in politics, more likely to use contentious forms of political action, and support left-wing political parties that promote minority interests.” (Just, 2017) Hopefully these minority groups will begin to feel more empowered to make their voices heard. President Obama tried to make many strides in equality stating, “There’s not a black America and white America and Latino America and Asian America; there’s the United States of America.” (Chua, 2018) We seem to have gone away from this type of thinking since he made that statement a decade ago.

Gender has also been a divisive part of American politics, especially in these recent times. Women were denied from even participating in politics until 1920 with the addition of the 19th Amendment and the guaranteed right to vote. The gender gap in American politics can be attributed to many different reasons. Women today have become more empowered to step up and make their voices be heard on many different topics from sexual harassment to political involvement.  This may be due to the fact of who is currently in the White House and his documented views and treatment of women. Until women are treated with equality in every form, there will continue to be a focus on gender, especially in politics.

I don’t believe that our current society would be better if all policies were race neutral. In a perfect world everyone in this country would be treated the same and everyone would have the same opportunities as everyone else. But this is not the case. Certain races and women have been disadvantaged for so long in this country and they need to be allowed to catch up to the level as everyone else so we are all on the same playing field before race and gender-neutral policies can be put in place. If everyone was equal, then yes, race and gender-neutral policies would be beneficial to everyone.

 

Chua, Amy. "How America's Identity Politics Went from Inclusion to Division." The Guardian. March 01, 2018. Accessed April 28, 2018. https://www.theguardian.com/society/2018/mar/01/how-americas-identity-politics-went-from-inclusion-to-division.

Just, Aida. "Race, Ethnicity, and Political Behavior." Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Politics. May 16, 2017. Accessed April 28, 2018. http://politics.oxfordre.com/view/10.1093/acrefore/9780190228637.001.0001/acrefore-9780190228637-e-238. Top of Form

Response _four_Pol-08 Based on US history, the focus and concern on race and gender come from the fact that white Americans are encountering the dilemma of being a minority in their own country since the emergence of the phenomenon of “browning of America” that promotes diverse population with different colors, cultures and nationalities (Chua, 2018). As a result, this phenomenon is replacing the concept of “white supremacy” and white Americans have become more anxious and this lead to the country’s transformation from inclusion to division to suppress such phenomenon (Chua, 2018). In fact, if all policies were race neutral, the underrepresentation of people of color would decrease significantly and would be fair, however, race and gender would be still focused on since the white American feel threatened (Indivero,2016). Race or gender-neutral policies would only give diverse group a chance of equal opportunity in life, in fact, everyone including majority will be protected and the tension between these groups will diminish (Kahlenberg, 2013). As a result, the right balance can be achieved by promoting racial and gender equality and according to Alexis de Tocqueville, minorities’ rights must be protected otherwise, the majorities’ rights will not only lose its meaning, but also would be unbalanced (Majority Rule and Minority Rights, 2013). In addition, it would create unbalanced society that lacks democracy based on James Madison adoption and creation of the Bill of Rights (Majority Rule and Minority Rights, 2013). According to the “British political philosopher John Stuart Mil”, the government should avoid being a vehicle for the “tyranny of the majority” because it is not only a critical political issue, but also a social problem that leads to stifling minority voices (Majority Rule and Minority Rights, 2013). Unfortunately, based on a recent research, 43% of African Americans don’t have any hope that America’s government will ever make the necessary changes to give them quality and this is one of the root causes of hate crimes that increase by 20%, especially during the election of 2016 (Chua, 2018). Works Cited Chua, Amy. "How America's Identity Politics Went from Inclusion to Division." The Guardian. March 01, 2018. Accessed April 26, 2018. https://www.theguardian.com/society/2018/mar/01/how-americas-identity-politics-went-from-inclusion-to-division . Indivero, Tori. "Focus on Research: What We Need to Know about Race-neutral Policies." Research Matters. July 06, 2016. Accessed April 25, 2018.  http://researchmatters.psu.edu/2016/06/27/focus-on-research-what-we-need-to-know-about-race-neutral-policies/ Kahlenberg, Richard D. "Race-neutral Policies and Programs for Achieving Racial Diversity." University Business Magazine. August 05, 2013. Accessed April 26, 2018.  https://www.universitybusiness.com/article/race-neutral-policies-and-programs-achieving-racial-diversity . "Majority Rule and Minority Rights: Essential Principles." Majority Rule/Minority Rights: Essential Principles | Democracy Web. 2013. Accessed April 28, 2018.  http://democracyweb.org/majority-rule-principles .

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