Racism: What Makes Something Racist?

Author: Dan Peterson
Categories: Philosophy of Race, Ethics, Social and Political Philosophy
Wordcount: 999

Many things can be racist.

What do the many different types of potentially racist things—actions, policies, laws, institutions, language, beliefs, feelings, people, and more—have in common that makes them “racist?” What is it for something to be “racist?” And why is racism generally wrong?

Theories of racism try to answer these questions by trying to identify the essence of racism, the unifying and fundamental feature(s) of all racist things that explains why they are racist.^[1] Different proposed roots of racism in individuals—their beliefs about, feelings towards, or treatment of others—and social structures suggest differing answers to ethical questions about racism.

This essay surveys some influential theories of racism.^[2]

1. Beliefs and Feelings

Some philosophers have argued that racist beliefs, racist feelings, or a combination of both are at the root of racism.^[3] Racist beliefs typically take members of certain racial groups to be morally inferior because of their race.^[4] Racist feelings are negative emotions like hatred, disgust, disregard, and contempt directed towards people because of their race. On these theories, other racist things are racist because of the underlying racist beliefs or feelings that lead to or support them.

Racist beliefs may be wrong because they draw moral distinctions between groups of people who aren’t actually different in any morally-relevant way.^[5] Believing that individuals are morally inferior because of their racial group(s) is wrong because racial groups don’t differ from one another with respect to any morally important trait, such as moral character or the ability to reason or live good lives.^[6] Racist feelings, which are often based on (flawed) racist beliefs, may be wrong because they oppose virtues of benevolence and fairness.^[7] And both may be wrong because they motivate people to treat others badly.

We can evaluate our own potential racism on these views, to the extent that we can understand whether our beliefs and feelings inferiorize and demean others because of their race. However, since we can’t always know for certain what people—including even ourselves sometimes^[8]—believe or feel, we might sometimes not know whether something is racist.^[9]

2. Treatment

Some instead argue that racism is best understood in terms of behavior: how people treat others.^[10] Behavior is often publicly observable, so focusing on it makes it easier to determine what’s racist. We can understand racist people, beliefs, feelings, and other racist things as those that support racist treatment.

Racist treatment is, in general, treatment that results in worse outcomes for people of one race compared to people of other races, plus some additional condition(s) to avoid cases like this: imagine people of some race end up winning a lottery less frequently than members of other races; if this result is due to truly random chance, this lottery isn’t racist, even if the results disfavor a racial group.^[11]

There are several additional conditions worth considering. One requires that this kind of treatment comes from racist beliefs or feelings. Another is that, in cases of racist treatment, race or beliefs about race must explain or cause the worse outcomes for one racial group.^[12] Alternatively or additionally, we could require that the treatment be unjust, unfair, or otherwise wrong.

3. Structural Racism

While our discussion has mostly focused on individuals’ psychology and behavior, not all examples of racism are best understood at the individual level. Consider the practice of redlining: Black people looking for financial credit were denied it based on their zip code, which, due to segregation, often marked their race.^[13]

Many bankers engaged in redlining may have followed this policy not because of racial hatred or inferiorization on their part: maybe they unthinkingly followed industry standards or what their boss told them to do without considering why people from these zip codes might be denied credit. Yet redlining is understood to be racist because it resulted in preferentially distributing resources to White people, resulting in worse outcomes for Black people.^[14]

To rightly call redlining racist, we need an understanding of structural racism, racism at a larger scale than just individual person-to-person interactions. Accounts of structural racism typically focus on racial hierarchies, or structures of power, within a given society. It’s possible to have racism, on this view, even if no individuals engaged in the structure have racist beliefs or feelings.^[15]

Nevertheless, not all racism must be structural. Imagine someone who privately holds false, negative racial stereotypes about another racial group that no one else holds. This person isn’t contributing to structural racism since their beliefs don’t support any real-world racial hierarchy or domination, yet their beliefs seem racist.^[16] The same seems true of racial minorities who hate and inferiorize the racial majority: if their feelings and beliefs are racist, they aren’t structurally racist.

4. Disputed Cases

The most obvious instances of racism are clearly wrong, for reasons reviewed above, but should we think that racism is always morally wrong?

Some philosophers have observed that some instances of racism are due to ignorance rather than malice.^[17] A person raised in a society where pervasive race “science” convinces them that another race is inferior may have racist beliefs, but their error may be intellectual—since they uncritically accept unreliable sources of information—rather than the result of bad moral character.^[18]

Additionally, consider the following:

• racial pride and solidarity;^[19]
• affirmative action, which, to address racism in education and employment, gives preference to certain races;^[20] and:
• preferring to date only (or no) people of a specific race.^[21]

While some people consider any racial preferences to be racist^[22] and thereby wrong, many argue that some racial preferences—such as perhaps some of the above—are not racist, or that they are not wrong, or that they are neither racist nor wrong. Thinking through what makes any racial preference racist (or not) helps us better understand whether racism is inherently wrong or whether it is wrong because of features it usually has, but not always.^[23]

5. Conclusion

Better understanding what racism is can help us understand when and why it is wrong and how we might lessen it and its harmful, unjust effects on individuals and societies.^[24]

Notes

^[1] Philosophers interested in defining racism typically have at least one of the following two goals: the first, the descriptive goal, is to identify a definition of racism that captures the way that most people use the term “racist.” Alternatively, the revisionary goal is to articulate a definition that makes this concept useful for particular projects like those of social scientists attempting to better understand our social world or social critics and activists looking to effect social change. See Mills (2003), Shelby (2014), Urquidez (2020), and Scott (2022) for more on the different goals and approaches taken by philosophers seeking better understanding of racism.

^[2] We will assume here that we understand well enough what races are for the subsequent discussion to make sense. For more on what races might be, see Philosophy and Race: An Introduction to Philosophy of Race by Thomas Metcalf and The Ontology of Race by Abiral Chitrakar Phnuyal.

^[3] In some of the most influential philosophical texts on racism, those who believe that racist beliefs ultimately explain racism often metaphorically describe racism as “in the head” while those who believe that racist feelings present racism metaphorically as “in the heart.” See Garcia (1996) for a theory of racism centered on feelings, Appiah (2017) for a theory of racism centered on beliefs, and Blum (2002) for a theory that includes both negative feelings and inferiorizing beliefs. The line between theories of racism that center racist beliefs and those that center racist feelings can be blurry; see Jaggar (1989) for one set of reasons to reject the view that there is a clear distinction between the mental and emotional.

It’s interesting to note that a person with racist beliefs need not have racist feelings, or vice-versa. Someone might believe she’s superior to people of another race but be motivated by that belief to try to help people of that race: she may have racist beliefs but not racist feelings. On the other hand, people of one race may have racist feelings towards another race but not racist beliefs about them, if, e.g., the first group hates the second because they see them as competent (and maybe even superior) competitors for some good jobs. For more examples like these, see Blum (2002).

^[4] One popular alternative account of racism from Shelby (2003, 2014) requires that racist beliefs be ideological, meaning that racist beliefs must be part of a collection of widely-held beliefs that misrepresent the social world in some significant way and which, through that misrepresentation of the world, support oppression.

^[5] See Appiah (2017) for more on this point. This principle that we shouldn’t treat others differently if there’s no morally relevant difference between them plays an important role in a famous argument against ethical egoism, a view that claims that each person is justified in giving moral priority to themselves, even at the expense of others. Interestingly, there are arguments that ethical egoism—preferring yourself—is wrong for reasons similar to why racism—preferring your own racial group—is wrong: see Ethical Egoism: The Morality of Selfishness by Nathan Nobis.

Racist beliefs are often understood to be wrong because they are false and intellectually or epistemically unjustified: racists generally have no good reason or evidence for their racist beliefs. For instance, they often rely on false stereotypes, hasty generalizations from limited experience, biased interpretation of evidence, selective attention to confirming cases while ignoring counterexamples, and reasoning from claims about groups to conclusions about particular individuals in ways that are unjustified. Racists often consider racial membership as evidence of moral character, intelligence, or human worth without justification.

Combined with the view that it is often morally wrong to hold epistemically unjustified beliefs—especially about other people—many philosophers conclude that racist beliefs are both irrational and morally wrong. For arguments to think that all epistemically unjustified beliefs are morally wrong to hold, see The Ethics of Belief: Is it Wrong to Believe Without Sufficient Evidence? by Spencer Case. Also see Indoctrination: What is it to Indoctrinate Someone? by Chris Ranalli.

^[6] See Theories of Moral Considerability: Who and What Matters Morally? by Jonathan Spelman for more on what features might matter morally and why.

^[7] See Garcia (1996) for this argument, which argues for the wrongness of racism from the perspective of virtue ethics. For more on virtue ethics, see Virtue Ethics by David Merry.

^[8] One reason to think that we might not always be aware of our own motivations when it comes to issues of race is the phenomenon of implicit bias, which suggests that people may act out of prejudice or discrimination unknowingly. For more on implicit bias, see Brownstein (2025).

^[9] For further discussion of challenges in identifying others’ thoughts and feelings, and our own, see Mindreading: Understanding Others’ Thoughts and Feelings by Emma Otterski and Self-Knowledge: Knowing Your Own Mind by Benjamin Winoku.

One possible benefit of theories that focus on racist beliefs and feelings is that this difficulty in determining when others are being racist may mean that the term “racist” is reserved for only the most egregiously bad things that indicate someone’s poor moral character, which racist beliefs or feelings. Because some think that the term “racist” is overused and so no longer feels as serious a moral condemnation to those who are called “racist,” restricting its use to only the most serious cases might help the term reclaim some of its moral force. See Blum (2002) for more about why “racist” has lost its force as well as Liao and Hansen (2023) for a response to Blum’s worry.

^[10] See Philips (1984) for one such account.

^[11] The motivation for this first part of this definition is the view that, generally speaking, people ought to be treated equally. On what this might mean, see Equality: What Is It, and How Is It Different From Equity? by Daniel Weltman.

^[12] Though he himself does not embrace the view that all racism can be explained by racist treatment, Arthur (2007) inspires this option by requiring that the target’s race must be part of the explanation for why something racist is racist.

^[13] For a history of redlining and its contemporary consequences, see Egade et. al. (2023). This practice began in the 1930s and was outlawed by the Fair Housing Act of 1968. Also see National Geographic (2024).

^[14] For the purposes of this essay, I will capitalize “Black” and “White,” for example, when referring to racial groups to distinguish this usage from other uses of these terms. Appiah (2020) articulates some excellent reasons for adopting this convention.

^[15] For one such view, see Haslangar (2004, 2017). For a critique, see Urquidez (2024).

^[16] This example is adapted from Scott (2025). See also Scott (2022).

^[17] Both Appiah (2017) and Shelby (2014) emphasize that racism may be an intellectual or epistemic wrong (epistemology concerns, among other things, what we ought to believe, given the goal of having reasonable beliefs) additionally to or instead of it being a moral wrong. For discussion of an influential view that all intellectual or epistemic wrongs are also moral wrongs, since they violate the “ethics of belief,” see The Ethics of Belief: Is it Wrong to Believe Without Sufficient Evidence? by Spencer Case.

^[18] For more on when it’s appropriate to blame others for something, including for their beliefs, see Praise and Blame by Daniel Miller. Also see Responding to Morally Flawed Historical Philosophers and Philosophies by Victor Fabian Abundez-Guerra and Nathan Nobis.

^[19] See Appiah (1989) for one philosophical discussion of racial solidarity.

^[20] For discussion of the ethics of affirmative action, see Anderson (2010) and Boonin (2011).

^[21] See Mills (1994) for a relevant discussion and Zheng (2016) for some moral concerns about racial preferences in romantic relationships.

^[22] For evidence supporting this claim, see Thai et. al. (2019), a study showing that people on a dating site who disclosed racial dating preferences were viewed as more racist by study participants, even those participants who claimed that they didn’t think having a racial dating preference was racist.

^[23] Even if we decide that racism is always wrong, one may wonder whether it is wrong by definition, meaning that anyone who understands the concept of racism must agree that anything racist is wrong. We could require, as part of our definition of racism, that racism always be wrong. But the fact that some perhaps competent English-speakers say they are proud to be racists—and so apparently think that some racism isn’t wrong—suggests that the wrongness of racism isn’t established by the definition of the concept itself (see Jaquet (2025): this issue can be motivated by thinking about whether speciesism is wrong by definition: on speciesism, see Speciesism: Discrimination on the Basis of Species by Dan Lowe). Another way to put this question is whether we should understand the claim “Racism is wrong” to be a necessary truth—such that anything that’s racist must also be wrong—or a contingent one—such that although many things that are racist in fact are also wrong, there is not a necessary connection between racism and wrongness, and so there can be things that are racist but not wrong. For more on these concepts, see Possibility and Necessity: An Introduction to Modality by Andre Leo Rusavuk.

^[24] In addition to the questions about racism raised in this article, one might ask how racism intersects with social identities like sex, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, socio-economic status, and religion. The concept of intersectionality (Lorde 2021) proposes that people’s multiple social identities create unique oppressions, and it may help those interested in this question.  On sex and gender, see Sexual Orientation, Sex, and Gender by Raja Halwani. On misogyny, see What is Misogyny? by Odelia Zuckerman and Clair Morrissey. Also see Feminism Part 1: The Sameness Approach and Feminism Part 2: The Difference Approach both by Annaleigh Curtis and Feminism Part 3: The Dominance Approach by Chelsea Haramia. A further question is how racism is related to dehumanization: see Dehumanization: What is it to Dehumanize People? by Dan Peterson.

References

Anderson, E. (2010). “Understanding Affirmative Action.” In The Imperative of Integration. Princeton University Press.

Ansell, Amy Elizabeth (2013). Race and Ethnicity: The Key Concepts. Routledge. pp. 135–136.

Appiah, K.A. (1989). “The Conservation of ‘Race.’” Black American Literature Forum, 23.1. pp. 37-60.

Appiah, K. A. (2017) “Racisms.” In Applied Ethics. Routledge. pp. 265-276.

Appiah, K.A. (2020) “The Case for Capitalizing the B in Black.” The Atlantic.

Arthur, J. (2007). Race, Equality, and the Burdens of History. New York: Cambridge University Press.

Blum, L. (2002) “Racism: What it is and What it isn’t.” Studies in Philosophy and Education 21.3. pp. 203-218.

Boonin, D. (2011) Should Race Matter?: Unusual Answers to the Usual Questions. Cambridge University Press.

Brownstein, Michael, “Implicit Bias”, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Spring 2025 Edition), Edward N. Zalta & Uri Nodelman (eds.)

Egede LE, Walker RJ, Campbell JA, Linde S, Hawks LC, Burgess KM. (2023) “Modern Day Consequences of Historic Redlining: Finding a Path Forward.” Journal of General Internal Medicine. 38(6). pp. 1534-1537.

Garcia, J.L.A. (1996) “The Heart of Racism.” Journal of Social Philosophy, 27(1). pp. 5–45.

Jaggar, A. (1989) “Love and knowledge: Emotion in Feminist Epistemology.” Inquiry 32:2. pp. 151-176

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Haslangar, S. (2017) “Racism, Ideology, and Social Movements.” Res Philosophica 94(1). pp. 1-22.

Jaquet, F. (2025). “Is Racism Wrong by Definition?” Philosophia. pp. 1-16.

Liao, S. and Hansen, N. (2023) “‘Extremely Racist’ and ‘Incredibly Sexist’: An Empirical Response to the Charge of Conceptual Inflation.” Journal of the American Philosophical Association 9 (1). pp. 72-94

Lorde, A. (2021). “Age, Race, Class, and Sex: Women Redefining Difference.” In Campus wars (pp. 191-198). Routledge.

Mills, C. W. (2003) “‘Heart’ Attack: A Critique of Jorge Garcia’s Volitional Conception of Racism.” The Journal of Ethics, 7(1), pp 29-62.

Mills, C. W. (1994) “Do Black Men Have a Moral Duty to Marry Black Women?” Journal of Social Philosophy, 25. pp 131-153.

National Geographic. 2024. “MapMaker: Redlining in the United States.”

Philips, M. (1984) “Racist acts and racist humor.” Canadian Journal of Philosophy, 14(1), pp. 75-96.

Scott, J. (2022). “Does Racism Equal Prejudice Plus Power?” Analysis 82.3. pp. 455-463

Scott, J. (2025). “Putting Racism Back in the Head.” Philosophy & Public Affairs, pp. 1-11.

Shelby, T. (2002). “Is Racism in the ‘Heart?’” Journal of Social Philosophy 33(3), pp. 411-420

Shelby, T. (2003). “Ideology, Racism, and Critical Social Theory.” In Philosophical Forum (Vol. 34, No. 2). pp. 153-188

Shelby, T. (2014). “Racism, Moralism, and Social Criticism.” Du Bois Review: Social Science Research on Race 11.1. pp 57-74.

Thai, M., Stainer, M. J., & Barlow, F. K. (2019) “The ‘preference’ paradox: Disclosing racial preferences in attraction is considered racist even by people who overtly claim it is not.” Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 83. pp. 70-77.

Urquidez, A. G. (2020) “A Revisionist Theory of Racism: Rejecting the Presumption of Conservatism.” Journal of Social Philosophy, 51(2).

Urquidez, A. (2024). “‘Racism without racists’: A clarification and refutation of the hypothesis.” The Philosophical Quarterly.

Zheng, R. (2016). “Why Yellow Fever Isn’t Flattering: A Case Against Racial Fetishes.” Journal of the American Philosophical Association 2(3). pp. 400-419.

Further Reading

James, Michael and Adam Burgos. “Race.” The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Spring 2025 Edition), Edward N. Zalta & Uri Nodelman (eds.)

Related Essays

Philosophy and Race: An Introduction to Philosophy of Race by Thomas Metcalf

The Ontology of Race by Abiral Chitrakar Phnuyal

Equality: What Is It, and How Is It Different From Equity? by Daniel Weltman

Theories of Moral Considerability: Who and What Matters Morally? by Jonathan Spelman

African American Existentialism: DuBois, Locke, Thurman, and King by Anthony Sean Neal

Reparations for Historic Injustice by Joseph Frigault

Removing Confederate Monuments by Travis Timmerman

Aristotle’s Defense of Slavery by Dan Lowe

The Ethics of Belief: Is it Wrong to Believe Without Sufficient Evidence? by Spencer Case

Praise and Blame by Daniel Miller

Responding to Morally Flawed Historical Philosophers and Philosophies by Victor Fabian Abundez-Guerra and Nathan Nobis

Epistemic Injustice by Huzeyfe Demirtas

Ethical Egoism: The Morality of Selfishness by Nathan Nobis

Indoctrination: What is it to Indoctrinate Someone? by Chris Ranalli

Virtue Ethics by David Merry

Mindreading: Understanding Others’ Thoughts and Feelings by Emma Otterski

Self-Knowledge: Knowing Your Own Mind by Benjamin Winoku

Immigration Ethics: An Overview by Daniel Weltman

Dehumanization: What is it to Dehumanization People? by Dan Peterson

Sexual Orientation, Sex, and Gender by Raja Halwani

What is Misogyny? by Odelia Zuckerman and Clair Morrissey

Feminism Part 1: The Sameness Approach by Annaleigh Curtis

Feminism Part 2: The Difference Approach by Annaleigh Curtis

Feminism Part 3: The Dominance Approach by Chelsea Haramia

Speciesism: Discrimination on the Basis of Species by Dan Lowe

Possibility and Necessity: An Introduction to Modality by Andre Leo Rusavuk

About the Author

Dan Peterson is a philosophy instructor at Morehouse College. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Michigan and specializes in the philosophy of physics, philosophy of science, and formal epistemology. He has research and teaching interests in metaphysics, philosophy of religion, philosophy of education, and ethics. He is also the co-founder of Mind Bubble, an educational nonprofit in Atlanta that provides local students with free tutoring and educational workshops. DanielJamesPeterson.com

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