Sixteenth International Conference on Environmental, Cultural, Economic & Social Sustainability

Abstract

It may be said that Critical Race Theory has reached two conflicting conclusions about racism in the postcolonial world. The first is that racism is a permanent feature of our social order—that its power, now ossified, ensures all victories over it are illusory. The second is that racism must be permanently dismantled—that any permitted vestige is an existential threat to our every aspiration of creating sustainable societies, communities, and organizations. Whether this conflict is resolvable may be as much a matter of philosophy as practice. Philosophically, resolving the conflict may require us to discern whether there are sustainable racial justice end points or only transitory racial justice journeys. In practice, this may require us to concomitantly discern whether structural changes can be gained via concerted planning and mobilization, or whether the only achievable ends are occasional respites found during moments of resistance. In furtherance of these discernments, this paper takes a historiographical approach. By analyzing the aftermath of discrete historical events, evidence will be presented to help readers understand which prerequisites, if any exist, are essential to supplanting the permanence of racism with a sustainable racial justice order.