Reverse racism

Reverse racism is a term used to describe acts of discrimination and prejudice perpetrated by racial minorities or historically oppressed ethnical groups against individuals belonging to the racial majority or historically dominant ethnical groups. In other words, it is reverse discrimination based on racial criteria.

The usage of the term is controversial. Conservatives have accused affirmative action of being a case of officially sanctioned reverse racism, describing it as "preferential treatment, discriminating in favor of members of under-represented groups, which have been treated unjustly in the past, against innocent people". On the other side of the political spectrum, groups concerned with social justice and the interests of ethnic minorities have gone as far as denying its existence altogether.

The term "reverse racism" came into use as the struggle for African-American rights divided the white community. In 1966, Hosea Williams of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), publicly accused members of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) of reverse racism in their efforts to exclude or expel whites from local government in Alabama to make room for blacks. Williams argued that the SNCC's intended "all-black" campaign in Alabama would drive white moderates out of the civil rights movement. "Black racism" was a more common term in this era, used to describe SNCC and groups like the Black Panthers.

It was not until the 1970s that discourse surrounding reverse racism emerged most forcefully, especially in reaction to affirmative action, as an outgrowth against colorblind hegemonic approaches in the post-civil rights era.

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