Philosophy Colloquium Series: William Paris

Crisis & Utopian Consciousness, and the Struggle for Racial Justice

For many, the George Floyd Protests of 2020 seemed like a watershed moment in the long struggle for racial justice in the United States. The images of large multiracial protests along with utopian calls to “defund” or “abolish” the police suggested that an historic change in public consciousness was underway. More people than ever were now viscerally aware of what racial injustice looks like in the United States. And yet, any honest assessment of what followed the protests would have to admit that the social order of the United States has remained fundamentally the same. In this talk, I assess the role of consciousness in struggles for social transformation. I argue against what I take to be an overemphasis on making agents aware of injustices as sufficient for social transformation