Tensions in the “American” Dream: Reflections on the Structural Logic of the System

• In Event: 205 - Regular Session. Race and Ethnicity in the Capitalist World-System II

Abstract

This paper draws from research exploring contemporary perspectives about the meaning of citizenship, nation, and race in the United States at a time when popular thinking is in flux.

The accumulation of social power sparked by the coalescence of working-class Americanism with excluded populations provoked a break from the liberal geoculture.

This newfound power incited a segment of the white population to shift from a commitment to the common good, involving a redefinition of who was included in the collective “we.”

This transformation was related to tectonic shifts in the social structures of the United States and the larger world-system that altered the social psychology of people in the U. S. This change was not simply of individual psychology; the redefinition of “we” was a profoundly social phenomenon.

This presentation will describe participants’ (demographically mirroring the U.S. population) perspectives about how individual and group location within the system is understood and internalized.

Nation, race, ethnicity, class, and gender organize society but also frame the ways that individuals think about the social world and groups within it, including how nationalism and patriotism are viewed.

It is apparent that the narratives that explain logic of location are useful in upholding the structure by providing explanations for inequalities of all sorts, yet it is also evident that most respondents question these rationales. They express a significant cynicism about upward mobility and true equality.

In conclusion, I suggest possible implications of this tension, for broad public engagement of social issues in the future.

Author

• Melanie E. L. Bush, Adelphi University