White Backlash in a Brown Country

Abstract

Discourse on “white backlash” implicitly references whites’ reaction to some perceived civil rights excess but fails to identify a more systemic etiology. In this article, Professor Terry Smith employs clinical psychology to analyze white backlash as symptomatic of whites’ addiction to privilege. Noting that the United State Supreme Court has only once even invoked the term “white backlash” despite its recurrence throughout American history, Professor Smith argues that this judicial reticence is due in part to the Court’s participation in reactionary resistance to civil rights progress. Using the diminished electoral fortunes of Democrats during the Obama presidency as a foundation, Smith argues that a new white backlash is occurring just as the nation is accelerating its transition from a white to a brown population. The article explores how this demographic shift differentiates current white backlash from past eras, as evidenced by, among other indicia, the emergence of a “new white nationalism” that has formed an imbricate relationship with modern political conservatism. The article concludes by discussing the ways in which the two major political parties are adapting to and exploiting the browning of the country and white trauma in response to the same.