Tagged: policy

“Critical race theory sprang up in the mid-1970s, as a number of lawyers, activists, and legal scholars across the country realized, more or less simultaneously, that the heady advances of the civil rights era of the 1960s had stalled and, in many respects, were being rolled back. Realizing that new theories and strategies were needed to combat the subtler forms of racism that were gaining ground, early writers such as Derrick Bell, Alan Freeman, and Richard Delgado put their minds to the task. They were soon joined by others, and the group held its first conference at a convent outside Madison, Wisconsin, in the summer of 1989. Further conferences and meetings took place. Some were closed working sessions at which the group threshed out internal problems and struggled to clarify central issues, which others were public, multi-day affairs with panels, plenary sessions, keynote speakers, and a broad representation of students, activists, and scholars from a wide variety of disciplines.”

Source: Richard Delgado and Jean Stefancic. Critical Race Theory: An Introduction. pg. 3-4. 2001.

“Critical race theory not only dares to treat race as central to the law and policy of the United States, it dares to look beyond the popular belief that getting rid of racism means simply getting rid of ignorance, or encouraging everyone to ‘get along.'”

Source: Foreword by Angela Harris. Richard Delgado and Jean Stefancic. Critical Race Theory: An Introduction. pg. xx. 2001.