Charles Mills' the Racial Contract

Charles Mills' The Racial Contract

Theses 8, 9 and 10

I. Thesis 8: The Racial Contract tracts the moral/political consciousness of (most) white moral agents (Most controversial chapter)

a. A naturalized account (actual) will help to lead to a prescription. Based on a racialized moral psychology (p.93): Whites act racist without even realizing it.

b. Much of the chapter is a long explanation of how whites have brutalized nonwhites (pp.98-101). Difference between cynical and realist.

c. Discussion of the Jewish Holocaust: It becomes an outright tragedy only when it is European against European. Quotes Hitler on p.106:

d. Whites who do not go along with the contract: Mills argues that there is a choice for whites in the racial contract, albeit it a difficult one - p.107. Going along with things makes us all guilty. On the other hand, if we do not go along, it makes us a "race traitor" (p.108).

II. Thesis 9: The Racial Contract has always been recognized by nonwhites as the real determinant of (most) white moral/political/practice

a. The "invisibility" of the Racial Contract to whites, and its visibility to nonwhites, p.110.

b. The Racial Contract norms white and nonwhite persons morally, epistemically, and aesthetically (p.118). Given this, what is required for a nonwhite person?

c. First, personal struggle for personhood by overcoming the internalization of the racialized norms (pp.118Ð'--119).

d. Second, cognitive resistance: thinking against the grain (pp.119-120).

e. Third, the somatic aspect of the Racial Contract: a politics of the body ( eg., black is beautiful), p.120.

III. Thesis 10: The Racial Contract as a theory is superior to the raceless social contract

a. Virtues of the Racial Contract:

1. Race should be at the center of contract theory rather than marginalized (p.122).

2. A racial contract would correct the foundational deficiencies of the raceless contracts (pp.123-4).