Racial Caste and Post-Racial Caste Impact on American Society and Democracy from 1619 to 2023

The eight features of a racial caste society as described in Isabel Wilkerson’s book, Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents, include approval of racial caste by a deity, eugenics and scientific racism, racial purity, control of marriage and mating, occupational hierarchy and control, dehumanization and stigma, terror as enforcement, and inherent superiority versus inferiority. These eight elements of a racial caste order were a significant part of the pre-U.S. and U.S. from 1619 to the end of the 1960s. Because of the civil rights movement, some features of the U.S. racial caste system, including separate public accommodations, voting rights restrictions, and housing, education, and employment discrimination, were legally abolished. Since the end of the civil rights movement in the 1960s, the tactics to establish a form of a racial hierarchical order have morphed. These recent tactics against African Americans include police violence, mass incarceration, voting rights restrictions, housing and economic discrimination practices, and one-sided classroom teaching of systemic U.S. racial history and practices. Despite the new tactics, the basic assumption of advocates of a racial caste structure remains, including white supremacy and dominance. Racial and post-racial caste practices contradict the ideals of democracy. Until there is a level playing field with equal rights, including voting rights for all in U.S. society with no significant racial hierarchy, the U.S. will remain an incomplete democracy as it has from 1619 to 2023.