Illustration by Max Pepper, CNN
The American Caste System
If you think the caste system is practiced only in third-world countries and what we refer to as banana republics, you’re mistaken.
Unfortunately being familiar personally with the caste system in India I know how it’s used to denigrate and hold back large sects of the population from realizing their full potential.
India is one of the world’s oldest democracies. Cultures learn from previous ones. The caste system is the optimal way for a civilization to participate in cultural and economic hegemony.*
The concept of classicism is rooted in capitalism. It is part of a myth created by the upper class to force the perceived “lower class” into demeaning roles to further their own agendas.
In Britain, it’s referred to as the haves and the have nots or royalty, in Russia, it is the Oligarchs. Here we call it the elites v. everyone else. It’s common throughout civilizations.
In its design it’s easily adaptable to different cultures, all with the same goal: Keep the power.
It has to do with race for certain, however, it isn’t all about race.
According to Isabel Wilkerson, author of Caste, The Origins of Our Discontents: Caste is the underlying structure of hierarchy that exists in many cultures. The cue can change with whatever society we’re talking about. For some it might be religion, for others geography. In the United States, the overarching instantaneous signal of where a person belongs is what a person looks like in terms of what we call race. Caste is the bones, and race is the skin.
It involves anyone or anything convenient to be “otherized.” It could be immigration, a notable disability, a certain religious practice, or other such occurrences.
Many forward-thinking philosophers, politicians and social psychologists have tried to combat our primitive instincts to no success.
The most famous being Karl Marx, who wanted a social world order based not only on individual success but a common purpose for all of humankind.
This remains an open question.
Can society as a whole come together for advancement for all or are we doomed to react only to our own basic and primal instincts?
Darwin argued it is the survival of the fittest and the ability to adapt to change. Others agree but take it further.
This is an overview in general. There are many paths that will emerge during the course of this series.
The first will be the origins of the American caste system almost always disguised as racial, however, there are subtle and not so subtle nuances dating back to how American society was formed initially.
My conversation with various social anthropologists and economists will be part of an ongoing series on Sona’s POV to begin this summer in Caste This.
*Hegemony: The domination of a culturally diverse society by the ruling class which manipulates the culture of that society the beliefs and explanations, perceptions, values, and mores — so that the imposed, ruling-class worldview becomes the accepted cultural norm.