The Trouble with Diversity: How We Learned to Love Identity and Ignore Inequality

by Walter Benn Michaels

Book Overview

"Michaels has written a bracing polemic that should quicken the debate over what diversity really means, or should mean, in academia and beyond."-- The New York Review of Books If there's one thing... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 080507841X
• ISBN13: 9780805078411
• Release Date: October 2006
• Publisher: Metropolitan Books
• Length: 243 Pages
• Weight: 0.05 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 6.9" x 8.6"

Customer Reviews

Essential reading on a key political topic

The main thesis of the book is that liberals' emphasis on diversity has undermined our attempts to address economic inequality. Not so much because we have a limited amount of attention that we can give to political issues, and if you are focusing on racial or ethnic issues, you aren't focusing on economic ones (although I think there is truth to this). More interestingly, Benn Michaels shows how a diversity focus makes it harder to think clearly about economic issues. One example: These days, there is a lot of effort put into "not looking down on poor people." That's classism, on analogy with racism. But as Benn Michaels points out, the main problem with poverty isn't that people look down on you: it's that you don't have enough money, and everything that follows from that. Poverty won't be solved by everyone thinking the right thoughts about poor people, but by getting poor people more money, most likely by taking some of it away from those who have more. It is much easier for people to pretend that we are all equal, in every way that is important; rather than grappling with the many important ways in which we're not equal, and to try to minimize that inequality. Another example: focusing on eliminating racism or sexism, I can be on the side of the angels, and it won't cost me anything. Focus on economic inequality, and I may have to really give something up. Much easier to talk against "discrimination." Michaels points out that Americans have a tough time talking about economic class. Part of this has to do with an overemphasis on diversity. We fall into a trap. Because we want to be egalitarian, value everyone equally, we wind up ignoring the ways in which poverty really does damage people, make them "less." Again, the topic is just unpleasant. Better to ignore it. * Here are three quotes from the book that get to the heart of matters: * "We love race--we love identity--because we don't love class" (p.6). Embracing identity is a way of avoiding issues of economic inequality. If the difference between us is a money problem, then we might have to do something about it. If it is a matter of our attitudes, those are probably fine already. And if we do need to work on them, we can do so without taking out our wallets. * "We would much rather get rid of racism than get rid of poverty. And we would much rather celebrate cultural diversity than seek to establish economic equality" (p.12). I would add that we'd "rather get rid of racism," in part, because most of that work has already been done for us. We're lazy, intellectually and politically. * "In an ideal universe we wouldn't be celebrating [or encouraging] diversity at all" (p. 14). True? I don't think so. I understand how Benn Michaels has gotten to this point. Still, I think that appreciating diversity should remain a core value of liberalism, but that we need to think harder about the full meaning of diversity. As a positive goal, diversity caught on in the aftermath of the civ

I wouldn't agree with his solutions, but he gets the statement of the problem exactly right

Short and cogent argument that the current "neoliberal" emphasis on diversity (of race, culture, language, or religion) devalues economic equality and real political progress. "Celebrating diversity . . .is now our way of accepting inequality." Michaels doesn't spend much time talking about his suggested solutions to the problems, but based on what he reveals, I would strongly disagree with most of his solutions anyway. He has, however, framed the arguments exactly right, and with a slyly sarcastic wit belying his income ($175k) and occupation ("tenured radical" English professor at expensive private university).

Draws sharp distinctions

This book is aimed at drawing distinctions between subjective matters of identity and objective matters of income and beliefs. Each identity is as good as any other, but being poor is worse than being rich. Michaels accuses the left of having lost its focus on objective equality, to the point of glorifying poverty. Treating poverty as a matter of identity is, according to Michaels, a pernicious strategy for willfully ignoring the problem that increasingly many people are increasingly poor, and have less and less opportunity to move out of poverty. Moreover, by fighting battles of identity -- WalMart and Wall Street women each making some percent less than the men -- we may ignore the fact that all the WalMart workers make a hundredth of what the Wall Street workers make. He does not argue against fighting injustices of identity so much as argue for prioritizing and looking at the problems in perspective. The book draws sharp distinctions between the kinds of arguments that make sense for identities and those that make sense for wealth and ideology. It is a call to action in addressing "equality of opportunity" for everyone (the American Dream), hand in hand with reducing economic disparity. This is an important social commentary, clearly and engagingly written, and exposing one of the great hidden weaknesses of politics in the United States. You may or may not be convinced, but reading it will broaden your view and sharpen your perspective.

I buy the argument; you should buy the book.

Prof. Michaels most persuasive point is that our society has neglected the laudable goal of striving for socio-economic diversity in our institutions in favor of emphasizing other classes of diversity. He relies on strong rhetorical skills to make this, and most of his points. He does not focus on the detailed statistics that would be necessary to convince many professional social scientists, but the prospective audience for this extended op-ed piece is more the general reader, who may be provoked into finding their own numbers to butress their arguments. The writing style is necessarily polemical, and it is likely that all readers will find some things with which to disagree. However, in contrast to other critics of modern implementations of diversity, the present author likely otherwise shares many views with advocates of diversity. Even those who take issue with Michaels' conclusions will find his ideas worth considering. His closest intellectual bedfellow is Thomas Franks, to whom considerable reference is made, along with a host of other timely sources (who may be dated in a few years!). I found the short book easily digestible in two hour-long evening readings.

A Brilliant and neccesary challenge

For many years the world has worshipped at the alter of diversity. This view has literally taken over the world, not only in the west, but extending itself to places such as Israel and India, in short any country that wants to ape the West. The idea is simple. Diversity is king. To make up for supposed years of not having diversity, which means a small class of the same ethnic and religious group ran most countries in the world up to the present time(for instance Anglo-Saxon whites in the U.S, Rich Sunni Arabs in Iraq), society must discriminate in favor of those who were discriminated against. This means that all institutions from TV shows, to the workplace to the University must have an 'equal' representation of society. But thats not what happened. The legacy of Dr. King in America was not diversity. It was racism. Instead of abolished racism and using color blind tests to recruit, which would ensure diversity inside meritocracy, people were recruited for their skin color, ensuring the legacy of racial hate. Thus in American universities there are mainly two types of people, wealthy blacks and wealthy whites. Asians and poor whites get the boot so that the college can brag about diversity. There is no mention of diversity of opinion. Thus in the sad obsession with race, and in the name of confronting racial wrongs, the picture is worth reality, so that a picture that appears diverse, is called diverse. This book tries to show the fallacy here. Those who are truly discriminated against in business, in college and everywhere else are the poor. Thus it is not just skin color that is a deteriminant of diversity but class as well. The wealthy have something in common with eachother everywhere regardless of color or religion, and for this reason recruting wealthy Africans does not truly fulfill diversity, in fact it is the opposite. True diversity is making sure to represent society, and society is primarily middle class and poor, so its time the major institutions reflected that and not just the fake color, which is only skin deep, that they do today. A passionate call to action. Seth J. Frantzman