Race and Ethnic Relations - Research Paper Example

ID Number: Race and Ethnic Relations Sociology is a discipline related to the scientific study of the social order. This can also be defined as a social science which uses various methods of critical analysis and empirical investigation to come up with a body of knowledge about human-social activity. The sociology of race and ethnic relations is an area of this discipline which studies the political, social and economic relations between ethnicities and races at various levels (Chai, 2004). This paper will concentrate on a fussy issue relating to race and ethnic relations and examine how policy addresses (or does not) the condition. This essay will also build up on materials and discussions from class relating school segregation, housing, affirmative action, the Dream act, incarceration and gentrification disparities and in addition, include a sociological analysis and research on these relations. Racism is the belief that diverse natural traits in human racial groups validate discrimination. This vice is popularly associated with illegal activities like mass murder, racial supremacy, genocide denial, exploitation, separatism, hatred, extremism, xenophobia and vigilantism. On the other hand, ethnicity refers to a group of individuals whose members recognize each other through a common heritage, habitually comprising of a common culture, language and ancestry. On the contrary, the ethnicity concept differs modestly from race, which is defined as the grouping based on priory acknowledged biological criteria (Chai, 2004). The study of race and ethnic relations rotates under topics related to residential segregation, racism and other social procedures between different ethnic and racial groups (Esser, 1985). These factors enable sociology to interact with other areas in the field of sociology such as social psychology, stratification and postcolonial theory. At the political policy, race and ethnic relations is discussed in terms of multiculturalism or assimilations. At the academic inquiry level, these relations can be discussed by experiences of individual racial-ethnic groups or in overarching theoretical issues. The problem related to racial and ethnic discrimination has vastly grown in many societies all around the globe. Some of the most prominent reasons include legal discrimination, slavery and segregation especially during the civil war period. While numerous individuals and societies continue to fight these vices, there are those who are directly promoting racial disunity and mistreatments of other kinds. Tragically, these misdeeds are always directed to the black society who is viewed as inferior in the global society. Moreover, racial tolerance continually traces a clear trend in the American society. Research shows that, during the past few years, there has been a noteworthy optimistic change, in perceptions of both African Americans and the whites’ society regarding the issue of race relations. Most of these issues are adversely relevant to racial minorities who face difficult issues concerning health care, poverty status and quality education. Poverty status is the chief issue linked with race and ethnic relations (Costello & Adrian, 2001). High inequality in income trends is the main cause of increased poverty levels especially among the black society. Relevant studies show that individuals in such an economic class face isolation which primarily contributes to high levels of racial and ethnic segregation hence, development of geographically concentrated poverty. This isolation is a primary cause of lowered incomes, fewer marriages, increased unwed childbearing and reduced employment opportunities. Somehow this poverty statistics are a reflection of the increased immigration rates (Gianni, Lemmi, Francesca & Vijay, 2011). De Facto segregation is the separation of individuals into racial groups in daily life. This factor is so crucial since it applies to activities such as using a public toilet, drinking water from a fountain, eating in a restaurant, going to movies, attending school and renting or purchasing a house among others. The European Commission against Intolerance and Racism defines segregation as an act by which a person segregates others on the foundation of one of the enumerated basis with a reasonable and objective justification. Racial segregation is normally taboo but can subsist through societal norms, even without strong individual inclination. Segregation can be maintained by means ranging from discrimination in hiring (also nepotism) to vigilante violence such as killing. De Facto separation may also arise from situations whereby, members of different races mutually prefer to do business and associate with members of their own race. Often, segregation allowed proximity in hierarchical situations, like allowing an individual belonging to a definite race to work as a servant of another person from a different race. Therefore, it can involve spatial separation of races and/or compulsory use of some different institutions e.g. schools and hospitals. On the analogous, housing also contributes to racial and ethnic relations largely. Housing can involve a house; either public or social, dance house or any enclosed space containing equipment or mechanism. The poor individuals live in shanties and other poor housing systems. Racial segregation still prevails in housing. Home owners are fearful of any factor that can adversely affect the value of their assets by excluding prospective minority purchasers (Priest, & Nieves, 2007). Black home seekers face a subtle exclusion process. Compared to white home buyers, blacks are granted fewer opportunities to inspect and buy housing facilities. This effect aggravates from the disproportionately inequality among Africans and Americans. The same effect is also imposed to the less-fortunate in the society since they lack the funds to afford better housing facilities. Affirmative action merely refers to policies that include factors like sexual orientation, sexual category, race, color, national origin or belief into consideration into consideration in order to benefit the unrepresented group. The chief areas that the unrepresented majority can benefit from include employment areas, business and education. Affirmative action is intended to promote equal opportunities often instituted in educational and government settings to ensure minority groups are also included in the program. Such actions together with poverty eradication programs can help the poor families in eradication of the situation. The DREAM act is also a contributing factor in relation to ethnic and racial boundaries. DREAM is an acronym which stands for the development, relief and the education system for Alien Minors. This is an American governmental scheme introduced in the senate on August 1, 2001 by Hatch and Durbin. Most recently the act was reintroduced on May 11, 2011. This bill provides conditional permanent residency to some prohibited aliens who are of upright moral character. These minors should have graduated from U.S. high schools and stayed for a minimum of five years in the state prior to the bill’s enactment. The bill further concludes that any alien, whose permanent residence status is terminated, should return to the immigration status that the alien had prior to receiving the residence status. The bill also includes immigrants as old as 35years of age. Additionally, gentrification refers to changes resulting from the rich (also known as the wealthier class) buying property in working class communities and low income areas. Urban gentrification is associated with movement. This process contributes to displacement of the poverty stricken in the societies who are unable to pay rents and property taxes. Urban gentrification changes the culturally heterogeneous character of a society while some describe it as having a suburban character. This act of acquiring property in low income areas has widely affected the poor society. Incarceration disparities deal with minor individuals who are imprisoned. More than 60% of individuals in custody are presently ethnic and racial minorities. For black males in their thirties, 1 in every 10 is in dungeon on any typical day (Holmes & Smith, 2008). These trends have been intensified by the disproportional impact caused by the war on drugs whereby, two-thirds of all people in custody, for drug-related offenses are people of color. According to the survey of Inmates in State and Federal Correctional Facilities, the federal prison population has vastly grown with most of the detainees being from the black society (Holmes & Smith, 2008). The poverty-stricken individuals also amount to a large proportion in the confinement premises. Relevant research shows that most of the people who are in prisons are from a poor background since they lacked basic needs and in order to get the needs, in one way or another they had to engage in crime. Some of the most common crimes include robbery, commercial sex (prostitution) and murder. Poverty is contributed to by all the above factors. Hence, this term can be defined as the deficiency of a certain amount of money or material possessions. Absolute destitution or poverty refers to lack of basic human needs, for example, health care, education and nutrition (Costello & Adrian, 2001). According to studies carried out by the World Bank, approximately 1.7 billion individuals are said to live in absolute poverty conditions with over 40% of them originating from the Sub-Saharan region. In the past, poverty was related to the race and ethnic relations. However, the supply of basic needs can be restricted by the constraints on government services like debt, corruption and loan conditions. Financial aspects of poverty center on material needs and hence, people lacking such material needs are supposedly considered to lack income (Costello & Adrian, 2001). Recently, poverty eradication proved a complicated issue and goal for many international organizations like the World Bank and the United Nations. The social aspect of poverty links scarce conditions to aspects of resource distribution. The social factors include health care, political power, access to information or education. Poverty, therefore, can be understood as an aspect of unequal status of the society and inequitable social relationships experienced as dependency, social exclusion and diminished participation capacity (Gianni, Lemmi, Francesca & Vijay, 2011). Such exclusion from the society can be reduced through empowered relations with the conventional such as through the provision of relational concern to the poor in the society. Poverty is mainly identified with excluded locations, precarious livelihoods, gender relationship problems, physical limitations, abuse of the authority, problems in social relationships, limited capabilities, lack of security, disempowering institutions and weak community organizations. Effects of poverty may create an assumed poverty cycle. One-thirds of deaths world widely are due to poverty-related causes succumbed mostly by women and children (Costello & Adrian, 2001). Since 1990, over 270 million individuals have died due to poverty-related cases. In conjunction with the World Health Organization, malnutrition and hunger pose as threats to the child mortality rates and other related deaths. About 1.02 billion people sleep without having any meal. Poverty can also be vastly contributed by technological advancement. Labor displacing technologies have been invented to reduce the amount of human workforce. Appliances such as computers among other machines have aided job replacement which has significantly increased poverty rates (Costello & Adrian, 2001). Even though, these technologies have considerably enhanced productivity, the fact still remains that unemployment has increased significantly. Statistics prove that the global poverty rate has reduced but, there are still over 1.29 billion people who are still living in poor conditions. Rises in the cost of living have also contributed chiefly to deaths. Food riots and hiking of food costs often attribute to about 40% of deaths globally. Research also shows that underachieved individuals are most likely prone to risks linked to poverty. Most countries are geared to work with individuals who come from able backgrounds with the required educational standards. Also, such unfortunate people are on high levels of teenage pregnancy, juvenile delinquency rates and the economic dependency on their sponsor’s low income. Additionally, poor children are more likely prone to diseases like flu, colds, fatigue, hunger, headaches, irritability and hearing difficulties (Costello & Adrian, 2001). These illnesses potentially affect the child’s concentration in class and even deteriorate the student’s focus on learning matters. Feminization of poverty is a factor that describes an occurrence whereby women represent unequal percentages of the world’s poor people. This includes poverty of opportunities and choices, such as the capability of leading a healthy life and enjoying basic rights like dignity, respect and freedom. The factors that affect the feminization of poverty place women at extremely high risks of being poor, especially lone mothers who have children. Case studies carried out in different countries show that women are significantly affected by poverty which originates as a result of race and ethnic relations. For example in the United Kingdom, women are deprived income and employment opportunities due to race and ethnic factors (Gianni, Lemmi, Francesca & Vijay, 2011). This becomes a significant factor in enhancing poverty in the region. Poverty increases the risk of lack of shelter. Most poor people are slum-dwellers who compose to up to one thirds of the world’s population. Research shows that over 100 million street families worldwide are arising from poverty-related matters. Though, orphanages have been put up to curb this problem, there are still a mainstream of those neglected in the lanes and streets of most countries. According to experts, many poor women are victims of trafficking in one way or another. For example, in countries like Zimbabwe, a majority of the poor females have turned to prostitution in order to survive. The governments in different countries should work on how to sustain their population by investing on cheaper housing facilities in order to eradicate the slums and other poor housing facilities (Costello & Adrian, 2001). An example is the Soweto slum in South Africa which has laid attention to the government of South Africa. Logically, there are policy instruments that can be employed to reduce poverty and hunger. They include governmental investments aimed in promoting pro-poor growth, social safety nets and other redistributive policies. Other means have also been applied including Bolsa Familia, which is a program in Brazil aimed to zero in on the poor families and eradicate poverty in such areas (Costello & Adrian, 2001). Local institutions are also being estimated to reduce poverty among other favorable measures. Lastly, to reduce poverty, countries all over the world should vastly focus on the education aspect. Other factors that can tackle poverty include increasing supplication of basic needs, improving education systems and healthcare, removing constraints on government services, controlling overpopulation, reversing brain drains, controlling overpopulation, increasing personal income and improving cultural factors to productivity (Priest, & Nieves, 2007). Pioneers in the field of education have a clear depiction of how education is the chief factor in reduction of the poverty state. With a solid educational background, individuals are capable of coming up with incredible ideas through which they can earn a living. Educational is the key to success, therefore, with success one can sustain a decent living condition. The current poverty policy based on different states should also be reinforced by intervention from other able organizations. This will ensure that relations of race and ethnicity will be re-invented to restrict discrimination of the black society and reduce ethnicity (Gianni, Lemmi, Francesca & Vijay, 2011). This will also deal with the fact that the white’s have stereotyped the black society as lazy. This form of prejudice towards the black society should be shunned fully thereby, creating unity among all citizens which will lead to economic growth in all nations (Gianni, Lemmi, Francesca & Vijay, 2011). This can effectively be achieved through the methods discussed earlier on in the essay. This will eradicate any form of discrimination against racial and ethnic minorities. In conclusion, we are able to wrap up that most of the countries in the world are employing minimal considerations to cope with the poverty case. The world should come up with one global program against poverty. Through this, we are assured that most cases of poverty related to race and ethnic relations should be efficiently reduced (Priest, & Nieves, 2007). Furthermore, the few institutions formed in other developed countries should also be able to support other countries. They should first establish the origin of poverty in the consequent states and employ an effective pattern of abolishing the state of poverty. Likewise, the developing countries should follow the course and develop initiatives to maximize on reduction of poverty. As a matter of fact, the race and ethnic relations should act as a major focus for poverty to be restrained (Costello & Adrian, 2001). References Chai, S. (2004). Predicting ethnic boundaries. American sociological review journal 21 (4): 375-391. Retrieved from http://esr.oxfordjournals.org/content/21/4/375.abstract?maxtoshow=&hits=25&RESULTFORMAT=&fulltext=race+and+ethnic+relations&searchid=1&FIRSTINDEX=0&resourcetype=HWCIT Costello, J. & Adrian, A. (2001). Poverty, race/ethnicity, and psychiatric disorder: A study of rural children. American journal of public health 91(9): 1494–1498. Retrieved from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1446810/?report=abstract Esser, H. (1985). Social context and inter-ethnic relations: The case of migrant workers in West German urban areas. European sociological review journal 2 (1): 30-51. Retrieved from http://esr.oxfordjournals.org/content/2/1/30.abstract?maxtoshow=&hits=25&RESULTFORMAT=&fulltext=race+and+ethnic+relations&searchid=1&FIRSTINDEX=0&resourcetype=HWCIT Gianni, B., Lemmi, A., Francesca, G. & Vijay, V. (2011). Subnational indicators of poverty and deprivation in Europe: Methodology and applications. Cambridge journal of regions, economy and society. 5 (1): 129-147. doi: 10.1093/cjres/rsr037 Holmes, D. & Smith, B. (2008). Race and police brutality: Roots of an urban dilemma. A journal of policy and practice. 3 (3): 298-299. doi: 10.1093/police/pap011 Priest, R. & Nieves, A. (2007). This side of heaven: Race, ethnicity, and christian faith. Oxford social science journal 71 (1): 126-127. Retrieved from http://socrel.oxfordjournals.org/content/71/1/126.extract?maxtoshow=&hits=10&RESULTFORMAT=&fulltext=race+and+ethnic+relations&searchid=1&FIRSTINDEX=0&resourcetype=HWCIT Read More