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Social Stratification

Notes that Malik argues that racism emerged in the 19th century as a rationale for inequality - in an age
which espoused egalitarianism. In the 17th century, it was used for enslavement of labour. There
have been a variety of “racisms” as it is obvious from the contemporary racial discourse. For Louis
Dumont racism is simply an inherent human tendency towards discriminations of status. Gunnar
Myrdal, certainly before Dumont, considers that racism is practised, for example, as an excuse for
slavery in American society. The fateful word “race” is appropriated to deny inalienable rights of
all men to freedom and equality of opportunity. Race prejudice is the perversion of equalitarianism
- the apparent national creed of the Americans.
Racial hierarchy and individualist egalitarianism represent two poles of a single socio-cultural
system, characterized with capitalist production. In a secular political order, perpetuation of racism
indicates a paradoxical situation in the modern world. Myrdal tries to explain how biological
racism has been transformed into a socio-cultural, political and economic system of deprivations
and discriminations.
Racism
“Racist mentality” aroused in Europe around 1800-1815. Hostile attitudes towards the Jews gave
birth to new belief. Theological dogmatism was opposed by way of belief in Science and Logic.
Jews were addressed as a “race”, having characteristics such as bad smell, hereditary diseases,
hidden illnesses, and other loathsome defects. German patriotism and pride in Nazism resulted
into framing of racial laws. Racial conceptions and stereotypes have found their way into
philosophical and theological thought in the 19th century Germany, France and other countries of
Europe. In fact, there is a close relationship between the rise of nationalism and that of racism.
Rivalry between Christians and Jews is well known as the two competed in all fields. Superiority-
inferiority complex haunted the two communities.
The protagonists of racism have argued that “race” is a kind of magic key to universal historical
secrets. “All is race, there is no other truth”. “Race is key to history.” In Great Britain and France
the notion that “coloured races” were congenitally inferior was spread out by powerful economic
interests. A sort of nexus was worked out between capitalist interests and psychological needs vis-
a-vis racism. Even in the writings of Karl Marx and Sigmund Freud references to racial thinking
can be found.
According to Peter Robb, “the concept of race included any essentialising of groups of people
which held them to display inherent, heritable, persistent or predictive characteristics, and which
thus had a biological or quasi-biological basis”. There may be different kinds of race theory,
reflecting various understandings of biology, history or societies. “The idea of race is a form of
this process (essentilisation) applied to humans.” “Racism occurs when characteristics are assumed
from generalizations and are not verifiable. Its crucial measures include the degrees of mutability
or plurality admitted to exist within categories, and the arbitrariness of their outer limits. But,
above all, racism implies a ranking according to the biological origins and features already
mentioned.”
Race and Indian Society
The question is : How far biology can be considered to have been essential ? In the context of Indian
society, skin colour, birth, sexual relations, etc., were considered the bases of quasi-racial
discrimination and stereotyping. Varna hierarchy reflected considerably racism. But it is difficult
to say that these categories were wholly or clearly biological. The mleccha was racially stigmatized.
“Untouchability” too reflected racial elements through exclusion of certain groups from the
community. The Hindu idea of dharma as inherited roles also reflected racism. Thus, in some way;
the terms such as “lineage”, “blood”, “breeding”, jati, varna, though quite distinct from “race”,
reflected some elements of the concepts of “race” and “racism”. Religious identities too in a sense
reflected racial elements.

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