Public Administration ETDs

Publication Date

5-12-1971

Abstract

It is the purpose of this study to show evidence of the cultural conflict characteristics of current black/white tensions in America and to identify the historic origins of currently prevailing attitudes concerning race and culture. Current chauvinistic American attitudes supporting the notion of superiority for whites and Western Culture are based on unsound and inaccurate historical data. The values supporting such a notion, hence, are equally unsound and are largely responsible for the ambivalent behavior of Americans in racial matters. Subliminal racism based upon a value of whiteness poses a serious threat to the social and political health if not the survival, of the United States. Efforts of government to effect racial integration in the United States has been largely centered in the nation’s institutions. If integration is in serious trouble in the nation, the nation’s institutions are also similarly troubled. The nation’s institutions are a reflection of the values of the American people, and are run by the nation’s public administrators. If white racism is institutional in America, then America’s public administrators bear the major responsibility for eradicating such racism. To eradicate racism, the people who run the nation's institutions must understand the social values which support racism. This thesis attempts to show historically that white racism in America is based upon a primeval value of whiteness; and to trace the development of this value through time into contemporary America. Because the American military is an institution which pioneered large-scale racial integration, it is treated as a laboratory in which the experiment of racial integration and the effects of contemporary color values are evaluated. This study concludes with the application of its findings to an evaluation of the attempts by this nation's institutions to eradicate color racism in contemporary America.

Degree Name

Public Administration

Level of Degree

Masters

Department Name

School of Public Administration

First Committee Member (Chair)

John Mace Hunger

Second Committee Member

Nicholas Llewellyn Henry

Third Committee Member

Frank Xavier Steggert

Language

English

Document Type

Thesis

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