Some remedies for a racial stalemate. Wachtel, a practicing
psychotherapist and director of the Colin Powell Center for Policy
Studies at the City College of New York (The Poverty of Affluence:
A Psychological Portrait of the American Way of Life, 1983, etc.),
posits that blacks and whites have labored mightily for years over
their racial differences - but instead of arriving at solutions,
they've merely reached a stalemate. In that sense, he argues, the
two are like a dog in hot pursuit of its own tail, spinning
endlessly and getting nowhere fast. Wachtel doesn't put it quite
that way, of course, but does suggest that there's a good deal
wrong with the very language used by blacks and whites, not to
mention their apparently shortsighted view of history. Does calling
someone "racist," for example, have the same impact as it once did?
Wachtel thinks not. Moreover, what many blacks view as racist
behavior in whites may in fact be indifference, a worse disease in
Wachtel's estimation. Along the way, the author takes an occasional
jab at fellow social scientists. But in the ease of Charles Murray
and Richard Herrnstein (authors of The Bell Curve), it's several
swipes: He notes that time was when groups now riding at the top of
their curve - Jews and Asians - once skulked at the bottom. Their
IQ test scores changed, he notes, with a bettering of their social
status. Wachtel claims that "racism" is too loaded a term and that
"affirmative action" generates more heat than light. Perhaps the
former term ought to be used in more clear-cut cases and the latter
retired in word, if not in deed. Regardless, his recommendations
are sure to anger those on either side of the racial equation.
Thoughtful and sophisticated reading for anyone with more than a
casual interest in race. (Kirkus Reviews)
Author Biography:
Paul L. Wachtel is a CUNY Distinguished Professor in the doctoral program in clinical psychology at City College and the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. He is a clinical psychologist of international reputation and the author of numerous books, including The Poverty of Affluence, Therapeutic Communication, Action and Insight and Psychoanalysis, Behavior Therapy, and the Relational World.
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