Race has no roots in nature

In a Newsweek Web Exclusive, Mary Carmichael dissects racial disparities in health care today. Briefly describing data to prove minorities receive lower-quality care, Carmichael spends the bulk of the piece explaining why solving this dilemma is no easy task.

As it turns out, her explanation is not clear either...

Health care disparity is tough to tackle, Carmichael says, because "health and race are both complicated issues to examine academically." How do we classify people into racial groups? What about multi-racial individuals? Do we allow people to self-identify, or do we enact some sort of government policy of racial assignment? Answers to any of these questions have implications for both health care and democracy itself.

Carmichael argues that in order to revamp and reform health care, we must look at both nature and nurture. We must look at genetic predisposition to certain diseases and illnesses (nature), as well as social and medical environment (nurture). Citing race as "a notoriously inaccurate proxy for genetics, since it's such an imprecise way of describing people," Carmichael touches on, but fails to attack a key flaw in health care policy.

Throughout this article, the author never mentions that race is a social construction. Not only is race an imprecise way of describing groups of people, but it has no basis in biology. Historically, racial categories in America--and the hierarchies that accompanied them--provided a way for white society to justify minority oppression and reap the benefits of their exploitation. Race is not natural; it has been nurtured within our social consciousness. Thus, race is not inherent or fixed, and it is not only imprecise but meaningless as a measure of nature.

That being said, there are differences in health outcomes across racial groups. Blacks have higher rates of hypertension and diabetes than whites, for example. I would add, however, that these differences can be at least partly explained by external factors: environment, diet, occupation, access to health care, quality of health care available, etc. While racial differences in health may be a useful frame for examining the health of our society, we should not assume these differences are due to biological or innate characteristics of groups.

The crux of Carmichael's argument--that bridging the health care gap is only possible if we take a step back and examine the larger social structures preventing equality in care--is a strong case for macro-level analysis. However, this analysis will be most successful if we look not at race as a fixed and immutable measure of one's lifelong health projections, but as a product of a history of institutional and social inequality.

Photo Credit: The Institute for Southern Studies