Race and Ethnicity
Chapter 7 Summary

This chapter covers the sociological analysis of racial and ethnic divisions. It takes a 'constructivist' position throughout, arguing that these divisions should be studied as social and political constructions rather than fixed, naturally occurring phenomena. Understanding ethnic divisions as social constructions is not to imply that they are of no importance. On the contrary, as the chapter shows, racial and ethnic divisions are highly influential. The chapter considers this influence under two broad headings:

• Inequality: there is a clear, although sometimes complex, relationship between differences of wealth, income, status, power and other life chances on the one hand and racial and ethnic divisions on the other.
• Social identity: racial and ethnic differences are an important element of our sense of sameness and difference.

Though this split is useful, it is also artificial, since there are obvious connections between inequalities and identities.

The chapter is organised into four sections:

1. Introduction: This examines the rise of the concept of race and places it in a global context. It then makes the case for a constructivist approach to racial and ethnic divisions.
2. Explaining Inequalities: This is an exploration of race as a source of inequality, focusing on the experiences of migrants in Britain. The material on inequality is extended into consideration of the practices and structures of racism.
3. Race, culture and identity: This discusses the content and influence of contemporary race discourses, for example through looking at the media. This is followed by consideration of a series of issues of identity thrown up by increased cultural diversity in Western societies.
4. Dynamics of inequality and identity: race, class and gender: This explores the relationship between racial and ethnic divisions and those of class and gender at both theoretical and empirical levels.