Roots of racialization, structuralism, and power in the United States

The United States has a long history of racial, ethnic, and economic competition for resources, political power, and socio-cultural capital. Since first contact with the indigenous peoples in the United States there has been a structural system used through political and military mechanisms to control, define, and articulate a socially constructed racial classification system. While most social scientists have for decades asserted that the notion of race is itself a social construct, most critical race theorists also argue that race remains a salient feature in U.S. society because it is deeply embedded in our social, cultural, political, and legal systems. Race is real because it has actual material consequences on the lives of every person living in the United States. Sociologists Michael Omi and Howard Winant provide a clear definition and theoretical framework for understanding how race and racial projects structure race relations, economic conditions, political arrangements, and access to power.

Omi and Winant's articulation of racial formation continues to be important to our understanding of group relationships in the United States. One of the most significant changes, though, since the publication of this groundbreaking work is the growth of the multiracial population in the United States and across the world. The other significant shift in racial representation is that a person of color, of mixed ethnic heritage, a black man was elected President of the United States. These changes lead us into asking the question whether the theory of racial formation as asserted by Omi and Winant still remains applicable today?