P1: GIG PB339B-13 PB339/Doane-v4.cls April 12, 2003 12:44 Char Count= 0 13 White Views of Civil Rights: Color Blindness and Equal Opportunity NANCY DITOMASO ROCHELLE PARKS-YANCY CORINNE POST There are few subjects that generate as much conflict in U.S. history as race relations (Kinder and Sanders 1996), and yet few white Americans think race relations is a topic about them. Gunnar Myrdal made the same point in his famous book, An American Dilemma (Myrdal [1944] 1996:37): “One can go around for weeks talking to white people in all walks of life and constantly hear about [the racism of other people], yet seldom meeting a person who actually identifies himself with it.” Myrdal’s point is underlined by Mary Jackman (1994:137), who argues that racial inequality is reproduced “without active participation by individual whites, and hidden from their view.” Thus, when it comes to issues of race, as Jennifer Hochschild notes (1995:55–71), most white Americans cannot understand “what the fuss is about.” The seeming inconsistency between the pervasive concern about racial con- flict and inequality in the country but lack of salience for many white Americans is captured in the controversial statement by Stephen and Abigail Thernstrom (1997:13), who claim: “There is no racism; there is nothing but racism.” This seeming inconsistency is also empirically evident in one of the most researched puzzles in the study of race relations, namely, that traditional measures of prej- udice suggest a growing liberalization of white racial attitudes, while whites continue to oppose public policies that are intended to bring about greater racial equality (See Bobo 1998; Kinder and Sanders 1996; Kluegel and Smith 1986; Sears 1998; Sniderman and Carmines 1997; Schuman et al. 1997). As a result of these unresolved issues, some scholars argue that there is genuine racial progress (Patterson 1997; Thernstrom and Thernstrom 1997), while others— often with the same evidence—argue that racism has just taken on a new or more subtle form (Bobo et al. 1997; Bonilla-Silva 2001; McConahay 1983; Sears 1988; Sears et al. 2000). This chapter seeks to shed light on the seeming inconsistency by describing the responses of white interviewees regarding their views on racial inequality. Like Jackman (1994), we argue that one of the reasons that white racial attitudes have puzzled researchers is because they have misunderstood the implications 189