Think of the term “racism” and what comes to mind? Do you think of slavery, unequal rights, or judging others based on what they look like? Ever wonder if this is just a word that someone made up for the heck of it? Well, the term “racism” does exists, but do you know why? It seems like nowadays, most people want to be decent human beings and treat everyone equally and fairly. Throughout time, we have come quite a way since the segregated south and Jim Crow Laws. At least one would think that, but have we really? Charles Mills argues in his book, The Racial Contract, that racism is at the core of the social contract. The social contract is known as an agreement between members of a society and society itself. People living in a society agree to …show more content…
I believe Mills was correct in arguing about his ideas regarding these two contracts, because they go hand in hand in various ways.
The social contract kept society working and stopped criminal outbreaks from occurring since it kept people under control, and everyone was meant to be treated equally. Under the social contract, everyone was meant to be free, forfeit the same amount of rights, and have the same amount of duties imposed on them. So, if this is the case, that would mean that everyone would technically have to be included in the social contract; not just white males, but women, and people of color as well. Breaking the social contract would mean that not everyone is being treated the same by the state, and this often occurred among African Americans especially. It’s easy to make the claim that the social contract clearly did not include every human being equally or treat every human being equally as it had intended to. African American slaves were clearly not included under the social contract because they were considered as 3/5 of a person and looked at as property. They surely didn’t receive the same fair treatment as others under the social contract, and this is what Mills argues to be the basis