Race, conflict and the international order
- London Macmillan 1977
- 157p.
While there are many books on race issues, this is the first extended study to examine race as a factor in international relations, The waning of white, imperial domination in the second half of this century has changed the balance of forces and - perhaps even more important - the ideology of international relations. The white nations are on the defensive; the black and brown demand recognition of the equality of races. The author begins with a discussion of the ideology of white racism, and describes how it was institutionalised in the USA, the British Empire and in other European colonies. He examines the major twentieth-century wars as the catalyst in the break-up of the imperial system. In surveying the 'post-imperial' development of pressures and conflicts, he pays particular attention to the United Nations as the arena in which these are most strongly operative. He then shows the connection between international relations and the internal contemporary situation the West, where racial dominance is exercised within the metropolitan countries that have attracted Third World labour, and where the United States is wrestling with the demands of its 'colonised peoples. In analysing the ways and means in which the Third World probes the weaknesses of the West, he shows how the power- less may exert pressure on the powerful. He demonstrates that 'race' - however amorphous as a category of political and social analysis – is emerging as the dominant force in the late twentieth century. This has been highlighted by the evolution of the Rhodesian problem since the mid-1960s, and the dramatic developments of September 1976 form the climax of the book. Hugh Tinker is Professor of Politics in the University of Lancaster. He was formerly Senior Research Fellow at the Institute of Common- wealth Studies, University of London, Professor of Government and Politics in the University of London, and Director of the Institute of Race Relations. His most recent books are A New System of Slavery (1974), Separate and Unequal (1976) and The Banyan Tree: Overseas Emigrants from India, Pakistan and Bangladesh (1977).