Why Critical Race Theory Could Impede Progress & Innovation | TaraElla Report LvCT

One of critical race theory's biggest issues is its epistemology of knowledge

Welcome back to TaraElla Report LvCT, Liberalism vs Critical Theory. In this new series, we will explore the differences between the critical theory worldview and the liberal worldview.

Today, I want to talk about one of the most controversial ideas found in critical race theory (CRT), and indeed, in all forms of postmodernized critical theory more generally: the view that certain values, ideas and forms of knowledge can be tied to a specific identity group. In CRT and adjacent thinking, we see this manifest as things like saying that traditional math education is 'white', liberalism is 'white', or the idea of meritocracy is inherently 'white'. In more extreme cases, even the objectivity that underpins science could be considered 'white'.

What I want to note here is that this form of thinking is certainly not limited to CRT. For example, many of the aforementioned things can be accused of being 'patriarchal' too, using the lens of some feminist critical theories. Indeed, postmodernized critical theory has plenty of influences to make them think this way. These include the core critical theory view that all dominant ideas in society are there to serve the dominant (or oppressor) groups, and the Foucauldian postmodernist idea that all knowledge and discourse is primarily shaped by power dynamics. The contemporary Theory Left's habit of assigning cultural ideas to identity groups is not limited to the dominant groups either, as seen in theories about 'cultural appropriation', which generally apply to minority cultures. Obviously, the culture in question must, in the first place, be defined as the property of an identity group, for these theories to work.

The main problem I have with this model of thinking is that it impedes the impartial discovery of objective truth. It also impedes the exchange of ideas between cultures, and ultimately the freedom of innovation that is required for social progress. In other words, what we have here is a model of thinking that essentially wants to throw out the best things about the Enlightenment, the very things that underpinned the great progress in science, technology and civil rights alike in the past two to three centuries. What I'm concerned about is that, many people don't quite fully grasp how important it is to defend these things.

What we need to be able to say is that, there is objective truth and knowledge, and it is a worthy endeavor to discover and learn it in the most robust way, regardless of race or other identity characteristics. A strong commitment to the objective truth, via the study of science, math and so on, cannot be tied to any race, because we're talking about the objective truth, and it is by definition valid for all. Good ideas, good music, good designs and so on can't be 'white' or 'black' or belong to any other race either, because the power of innovation belongs to the whole of humanity, and shouldn't be limited by the boundaries of identity. I believe that, if we fail to defend these fundamental truths, we will have failed the future of humanity.

On Academic vs Political Versions of Critical Race Theory | TaraElla Report LvCT

Why the real worry is not the academic stuff, but the activist adoption of CRT's ideas.

Welcome back to TaraElla Report LvCT, Liberalism vs Critical Theory. In this new series, we will explore the differences between the critical theory worldview and the liberal worldview.

Last time, we talked about why critical race theory (CRT), and critical theory in general, are inherently revolutionary and anti-liberal to some extent. At the end of the last episode, I briefly discussed how there are different 'levels' of CRT, and how an academic and nuanced approach to CRT might still be compatible with liberal commitments, but a politicized and revolutionary approach might not be. Today, I want to expand on this point.

Hypothesis vs Fact

CRT is based on a set of assumptions, including the idea that racism is ordinary and pervasive in America and several other Western countries, and that the political system in these countries are inherently unfair towards non-white people. Therefore, it is often said that, in CRT, the question being asked is not 'is racism present in this scenario', because it is always assumed to be present. Rather, the question being asked becomes 'how is racism being present and affecting this scenario'. It also logically follows that CRT tends to assume that racial disparities are due to 'the system' being racist, and applies this assumption in its analysis of all kinds of racial disparities.

I think a critical distinction that needs to be made here is whether the central assumptions of CRT are being presented as hypothesis or fact. As a liberal, I believe in being open-minded in our search for the truth. As such, I welcome people coming up with and exploring all sorts of hypotheses. This is why I am so passionate about free speech.

What I cannot accept, and what many people cannot accept, is when hypotheses are being treated as facts, without adequate objective evidence to conclusively prove their truth. This is especially concerning, if such 'truths' are being used to develop solutions to cure social ills. Think about this: you would expect your doctor to be practicing evidence-based medicine. Why shouldn't we expect those proposing social change to practice evidence-based politics?

Academic vs Politicized Critical Theory

This brings me onto the next point. CRT, indeed all of critical theory, started out as academic theory. As some might say, the core assumptions of CRT might be controversial, and might not always be true, but it remains a useful 'lens' to do research and thinking around. I have no problem with the existence of CRT as a lens of academic inquiry, as long as we remain very aware of the limitations of the products of such academic inquiry. (In the past, I have also raised concerns regarding the balance between criticalist perspectives vs other perspectives in contemporary academia, but that's another issue.) If the insights from academic CRT are taken with awareness of their limitations, and in balance with other perspectives, then the results might not always be incompatible with liberal commitments.

What I, and I suspect many people, have a problem with is the popularized and politicized form of CRT. What I mean by 'popularized and politicized CRT' is where ideas from CRT thinking, like colorblind racism, the pervasiveness of white supremacy, intersectionality and so on are taken out of the academic context, and applied in popular culture, political debates, and especially the culture wars. Unlike academic CRT, this form of 'CRT' is much less nuanced. After all, when doing academic work, one is generally encouraged to think about the strengths, weaknesses and limitations of one's work. However, in politics, especially in the culture wars, no such requirement applies. Indeed, such reflexivity is often seen as weakness in the face of the enemy. Thus politicized CRT is much more dogmatic, much more rigid, and often incompatible with liberal commitments to individual-level equality, free speech, freedom of conscience, and so on. Therefore, it is justified, even for liberals who are otherwise OK with academic CRT, to be concerned about CRT-type ideas being applied outside the university setting.

An even more worrying trend in recent years has been the adoption of CRT and associated ideas as part of a wider revolutionary agenda by those with a revolutionary, as opposed to reformist, political orientation. In this new revolutionary adoption of CRT, the assumptions of CRT are taken as fact, and indeed as justification for the need to overturn the current (liberal) system. Furthermore, in extreme cases, any opposition to CRT could be painted as 'upholding white supremacy', a view essentially justified on the grounds of Foucaldian postmodern philosophy rather than objective reality. Now, this would indeed be the opposite of an evidence-based approach to resolve our social ills. And I truly fear where such a misguided approach will lead us to.

Why Critical Race Theory is Inherently Anti-Liberal | TaraElla Report LvCT

Welcome back to TaraElla Report LvCT, Liberalism vs Critical Theory. In this new series, we will explore the differences between the critical theory worldview and the liberal worldview. I will also be discussing, from a liberal perspective, how we might handle the conflicts the inevitably arise, and how we can stand our ground firmly while still being constructive about advancing social justice. At least in the beginning, I will be focusing on critical race theory, because it is the most discussed form of critical theory right now, but the themes I will be discussing can actually be applied to most, if not all, types of critical theory.

Last time, we talked about why CRT, and critical theory in general, are inherently revolutionary, and can be counter-productive for those of us who believe in a reformist path to progress. This time, I'm going to talk about a related topic: why critical theory in general stands opposed to the commitments of liberalism. In my recent work on CRT, I have often said that CRT is anti-liberal, and liberals should take a stand against CRT. Every time I've said this, some people have demanded that I explain it in more detail. Well, here it is.

The Liberal Reformist vs the Anti-Liberal Revolutionary

The Western progressive divide of reform vs revolution that I discussed last time is also highly correlated with another divide, that of liberal vs anti-liberal. Liberalism is a cannon of philosophy, political theory and ideals that has its roots in the Enlightenment. Liberals generally believe in liberty and equality between individuals, although there have always been differences in terms of how that might be defined and achieved. While liberals believe in individual liberty, they believe in civilization being the key to guarantee liberty. Hence, liberals are believers in an ordered liberty based on a fair and commonly accepted social contract, which sets them apart from anarcho-individualists, for example. Another common belief among liberals is the importance of pursuing objective truth, and the belief that the improvement of the human condition comes from pursuing and knowing the truth. Many foundational liberal thinkers, including John Locke and John Stuart Mill, are often considered to be great empiricial thinkers. Mill's commitment to free speech was rooted in his desire to let the sound ideas prevail over time. For many liberals, individual liberty, and the free speech and freedom of conscience that comes with it, are inherently linked to the need to pursue truth and knowledge.

The reformist progress of the 19th and 20th centuries (and indeed, even more recent reforms like gay marriage) were all largely rooted in liberalism. Over successive generations, liberals shaped the political systems of the West around their values and ideals. The gradually liberalizing political system allowed reforms like universal suffrage, civil rights, freedom of association and unionization, and so on to happen, which then served to reinforce liberal values, and inspire further rounds of reform. Hence, in this context, the committed reformist is inevitably a liberal, at least to some extent. The reverse is also true: liberals generally haven't seen the need for revolution in a long time, given that the liberal project is already being rolled out gradually via reform. While we still have a long way to go to realize the promise of liberty and equality for every individual under all circumstances, from a liberal point of view, things are improving all the time, and we have very good reason to stay the course.

Therefore, in the context of the 20th and 21st century West, the revolutionaries are generally discontents of liberalism. Basically, these people believe that liberalism will not lead to the betterment of humanity, because it has not brought about their desired utopia. More on this later.

Why It's Not Really About Social Justice

To justify their view that liberalism is the stumbling block to utopia, the revolutionaries generally resort to painting a bleak picture of the results of liberal reform (as you would expect). This is why CRT thinkers and supporters often like to downplay or take a pessimistic view of the achievements of the 20th century civil rights movement in improving racial justice in America, for example. It's also why radical feminists often downplay the very real advancement in women breaking the glass ceiling in the past 50 years, or why revolutionary LGBT activists often dismiss concrete achievements like marriage equality. It's all about liberalism not working for the people. Which is clearly not true. But it's the narrative that the various critical theories, including CRT, like to promote over and over again. The harm of this is that it reduces the energy and enthusiasm for further reform (which is what the criticalists want, but would be very bad for minorities who are still waiting for their equal opportunity).

As you can see, the bitterness of criticalism is squarely aimed at liberalism itself. Underlying this bitterness towards liberalism is often an (in my opinion misguided) view that liberalism enslaves humanity in some way. For example, I did a detailed two-part analysis of the real motivations behind critical theorist Herbert Marcuse's justification to limit free speech, and I concluded that it was due to a desire to abolish Freudian repression rather than a desire to advance social justice.

Indeed, given that liberal reformism has produced good results for social justice so far, there really can be no justification to 'burn it all down' without proof that the alternative is going to be better. Therefore, my logical reasoning has led me to the conclusion that the anti-liberal sentiment at the root of criticalism is not really about social justice at all. Rather, criticalists romaniticize an imagined utopia, and are bitter towards liberalism for failing to deliver this impossible utopia. What criticalists do not understand is that their utopia isn't possible because of human nature, biological constraints, scarcity of resources, and so on. No system can completely overcome these limitations. It's a fact that criticalists, in their revolutionary optimism, have generally not been willing to face.

Critical Theory Opposes the Core Values of Liberalism

Besides trying to discredit the fruits of liberalism, contemporary critical theories also often attack the foundational values of liberalism. This is why they don't have much appreciation for free speech, freedom of conscience, objectivity and empiricism, all fundamental ingredients of liberal philosophy. In more extreme cases, there is also skepticism towards things like electoral democracy, equality of opportunity, and even scientific truth.

I think the core conflict here is that, while liberals believe that the objective truth will liberate and advance humanity, criticalists clearly don't believe that. Instead, they believe that the objective truth either doesn't exist or is not knowable (inspired by postmodernism), and what is important are dynamics of power and oppression (which is the core critical theory view) and repression (from Marcuse). Therefore, liberals are dedicated to pursuing the objective truth, and setting up values and systems that allow us to do that, while criticalists will always decry these values and systems as being oppressive. This actually represents an irreconcilible difference, no matter which way you look at it.

Torwads a Constructive Liberal Attitude on CRT

Therefore, as liberals, in the face of the rise of critical theory thinking, we must stand our ground firmly. At the level of overarching values, it's either our way or their way. There is really no ground for compromise here. This is what I mean when I say that liberals should be unafraid to take a firm and public stance against CRT.

On the other hand, liberalism isn't against the existence of CRT (or other types of critical theory) as one school of thought among many that exists in the marketplace of ideas. As someone once put it, liberalism isn't opposed to critical theory being one available perspective to examine social issues. However, critical theory, in its political activist form, often demands the acceptance of its assumptions about the world, to the exclusion of many liberal principles, due to its core view of culture being a ground for power struggle between groups. The truth is, critical theory comes in many different 'levels', from an academic lens that might be useful for research but is also aware of its potential limitations, to a politicized form that essentially demands acceptance of its doctrines in all areas of cultural and political life. Thus, some 'levels' of critical theory could be compatible with a liberal political system, whilst the more extreme levels might not be. As a liberal, I think it is important to make this distinction.

Furthermore, even as a liberal, I have to admit that the concerns raised by CRT (or other types of critical theory) are not always invalid. Referring back to the aforementioned point about academic forms of critical theory with appropriate nuance, I don't deny that they could be useful for revealing aspects of racism that could be ignored by mainstream thinking. As liberals, we should always welcome a diversity of perspectives, and we should always be open-minded about the need to further improve society for marginalized individuals and communities. As such, we can think of some forms of academic CRT as a mirror, holding our liberalism up to scrutiny, so that we can make sure we remain on the path to removing racism.

However, the key to standing our ground as liberals is that the social and political actions we support in the name of anti-racism must be rooted in a desire to better adhere to liberal ideals like moving towards race blindness, fostering equal opportunity for every individual, and so on. With this in mind, we would certainly have to stand against proposals from certain CRT thinkers (e.g. Ibram X. Kendi) which contain elements that betray the aforementioned liberal vision.

Why Critical Race Theory Can't Escape Its Revolutionary Roots | TaraElla Report LvCT

Welcome back to TaraElla Report LvCT, Liberalism vs Critical Theory. In this new series, we will explore the differences between the critical theory worldview and the liberal worldview. I will also be discussing, from a liberal perspective, how we might handle the conflicts the inevitably arise, and how we can stand our ground firmly while still being constructive about advancing social justice. At least in the beginning, I will be focusing on critical race theory, because it is the most discussed form of critical theory right now, but the themes I will be discussing can actually be applied to most, if not all, types of critical theory.

In the first two parts of this series, I want to talk about the roots of critical race theory (CRT), and the roots of critical theory more broadly, and what this means in terms of its incompatibility with liberal and reformist thinking. I will be highlighting where the conflict actually lies, and what we could do about it as committed liberals.

To understand the roots of CRT and critical theory more generally, I think we need to place these schools of thinking in the wider landscape of Western progressive philosophy. In particular, we should examine it through two important perspectives: the reform vs revolution split, which I will be focusing on today, and the liberal vs anti-liberal split, which will be the topic of the next installment.

Why CRT is Inherently Revolutionary

The reform vs revolution split has always been a fundamental divide in Western progressive philosophy, theory and politics. In the beginning, Europe was ruled by absolute monarchies, and the only path to progressive change seemed to be revolution. However, after a messy period, where there was a combination of revolution, reform, reaction and backsliding, the reformist program began to show great promise by the late 19th century. The gradual success of reformism, including the arrival of democracy, the expansion of free speech, the gradual expansion of the franchise to all adult citizens regardless of race, religion, gender or class, and the legalization of trade unions and collective bargaining, fundamentally made Western society better by the 20th century. Objectively, the successes of the reformist program were undeniable. This meant that, as time went on, more and more progressives became committed to the reformist path, and rejected the need for any further revolution. On the other hand, there were those who continued to insist on the need for revolution.

Up until World War II, the revolutionary faction of Western progressivism was still quite strong. This was supported by a workers' based revolutionary Left, which made sense because of the continued poverty and misery of the working class. However, around the time of WWII, further progress was made, in the form of the New Deal in America and a generous social safety net covering healthcare, education, unemployment and more in many European countries. By the mid 20th century, it was clear that workers in the West were much more satisfied with their lives, and revolution was clearly not imminent, given the majority were happy with the status quo broadly speaking. Thus even more progressives, union leaders and thinkers alike, gravitated towards reformism.

Revolution became a lonely cause in the West, and committed revolutionaries were desperate to find a way forward. In particular, they needed to find new revolutionary subjects, now that a purely workers' revolution was highly unlikely. It was at this time that the fundamental ideas behind CRT gradually became popular among academically inclined revolutionaries. While Critical Theory was invented by the Frankfurt School back in the 1930s, it only became popular and influential after the 1960s, particularly in the English speaking world. It was also in the mid 20th century that the various ideas that would become postmodernism first emerged in France, and later spread to the English speaking world.

Contemporary critical theories of all kinds, including CRT, generally incorporate influences from the original Critical Theory of the German Frankfurt School, Herbert Marcuse's Freudo-Marxian theories, French postmodern philosophers like Foucault and Derrida, and other philosophical fellow travellers. This inheritance makes them inherently revolutionary at their roots. In particular, they are inherently revolutionary because of a core assumption that lie at the bottom of their worldview, an assumption that scholars of CRT have plainly stated in various ways in their works. The assumption is that there are pervasive systems of oppression based around oppressor group vs oppressed group dynamics working throughout society, and that our political and legal systems, as well as our cultural conventions and institutions, are all inherently part of these systems of oppression. The implications of this is that trying to reform our way to social justice is futile, and we must burn it all down and start over again.

The Conflict Between Reform and Revolution

In recent years, there has been a view among some on the Left that reform and revolution are not incompatible. This is a romantic view, and one that is often promoted by revolutionaries who want to recruit followers from reformist movements. But an objective appraisal of the evidence shows otherwise. As I often like to point out, the gay marriage movement was successful because it was clearly reformist, and there was not much revolutionary sentiment to compete with it at the time. On the other hand, the 1960s and 70s ended up a mixed bag, and was followed by the reactionary 1980s because revolutionism limited the progress of reform. As somebody who is passionate about making people's lives better in a practical way, I definitely know which path I want us to go down. (And it's clearly not the revolutionary path.)

Reform and revolution are incompatible because reform is about making the existing society better, and revolution is about tearing it apart to start all over again. Reform harms revolution by reducing the need for revolution, just like with the working class in the early to mid 20th century. This is why many true revolutionaries don't really welcome the success of reformism. I actually think this explains the negativity of CRT thinkers towards the fruits of the civil rights movement. On the other hand, revolutionary politics harm reformism by creating a constant threat that the social fabric, and people's familiar lives, are going to be pulled apart and turned upside down. This prospect is understandably unwelcome for many people, and will be met with a reactionary attitude, which will also lead to the widespread rejection of reform.

Indeed, reformism builds the broad public support required for change in democracies by promising to make everyone's lives better. Revolutionary politics and rhetoric in the background makes our case less credible. The specific oppressor vs oppressed model used in various critical theories further creates the impression that social change will create winners and losers, by 'turning the tables of oppression'. This, of course, further undermines the case for any change among the general public. This is why reform and revolution are always going to be at odds with each other. There is no denying this fact.

The trouble with the rise of CRT is that, since the paths of reform and revolution are inevitably in conflict in multiple ways, the popularization of an inherently revolutionary mode of thinking is going to distract from, and even harm, the prospect of further reform. Indeed, this is happening not just with race and CRT, it is also clearly happening with LGBT activism, which has generated a new wave of backlash that trans people like myself are very aware of. It's what's inspired me to speak up against this new wave of revolutionary politics. Because ultimately, it's what's best for people that matters, and what's proven to help is sticking to the reformist path that has delivered evidence-based benefits.

In the next part, I will talk about why CRT and critical theory in general are inherently anti-liberal. I will also talk about how we, as reformists, liberals, and practical progressives, can develop a constructive approach towards critical theory, that allows us to stand our ground when it comes to key liberal values and principles, while still having space to acknowledge the potential academic value of CRT and other similar theories.