In simple terms, Critical Race Theory (CRT) says America still possesses racism that’s at least partially hidden, but still serious. Some level of racism lurks in how we as Americans define what is “normal” in the criminal justice system, in laws, in all levels of education, etc.

Put another way, CRT says that American institutions (i.e., government, education, media, criminal justice system), social norms (i.e., what clothes to wear, how to speak, etiquette, etc.), and many widely held beliefs (i.e., religion, patriotism, philosophies) are corrupted by obscured yet widespread racism.

CRT’s goal is equitable outcomes between races and comprehensive liberation for all minorities.

Interestingly, what this liberation should look like and other fundamental questions, are often left unanswered by CRT. As a theory, CRT primarily critiques other theories while offering few positive values or beliefs. It prioritizes action and results over ideals.

Kimberlé Crenshaw, a CRT legal scholar and the one who coined the term CRT, once remarked that CRT is like a verb in nature, since it is dynamic and action-oriented. According to CRT, there is no such thing as “neutral” scholarship or “neutral” theories; scholarship always includes social influences, motivations, and biases.

Unlike most “theories,” CRT includes real-world action and public policy change as a necessary part of itself. This idea is based on CRT’s predecessor, Critical Theory. CRT consistently critiques the culture since it believes that racism adapts and is, therefore, nearly impossible to eradicate.

CRT is primarily a legal and social science. To eliminate racism, however, this social science must critically examine literature, education, politics, philosophy, theology, and anything else to uncover its supposed latent racism. Then CRT requires removing racism through real-world change based on those findings.

CRT began as a niche academic and legal study, so it went largely unnoticed during its early years. Now, however, many tenets of Critical Race Theory are widely held (though they are not always known as CRT).

This will become clear as we unpack CRT further.

What is Critical Race Theory?

In Critical Race Theory: An Introduction, Richard Delgado and Jean Stefancic (two prominent CRT proponents) define the main beliefs of CRT.

• “Racism is ordinary, not aberrational.” Racism is a common, lived experience of people of color in America. Within this, they argue the “system of white-over-color ascendancy serves important purposes, both psychic and material, for the dominant group.” In other words, white people as a group are privileged socially and economically over and against people of color.
• White people, as a dominant group, have “very little incentive to eradicate racism” since racism serves their interests.
• “Race and races are products of social thought and relations . . . they correspond to no biological or genetic reality.” Race is a human construct created by white academics and the social institutions of that time to gain power. And the construct continues to serve white people.
• CRT followers believe in “anti-essentialism and intersectionality.” This means that no person has a unitary identity; each person is part of multiple “groups” of identity, and that there is no objectively grounded human nature.

Critical Race Theory’s definition is slippery, especially when framed as a worldview, because its primary foundation is a critique of other worldviews. For example, the worldview of CRT generally rejects the idea of a universal, correct, abstract worldview. To believe that one worldview correctly describes the world is, ironically, opposed to the worldview of CRT.

As Ibram X. Kendi writes in his work of CRT, How to Be an Antiracist, “When people contend that Black spaces do not represent reality, they are speaking from the White worldview of Black people in the minority. They are conceptualizing the real American world as White. To be antiracist is to recognize there is no such thing as the ‘real world,’ only real worlds, multiple worldviews” (emphasis added).

Or again, CRT proponent Dr. Robin DiAngelo writes in White Fragility: “We make sense of perceptions and experiences through our particular cultural lens. This lens is neither universal nor objective, and without it, a person could not function in any human society.” Of course, this is true on its face. We each do have a subjective way of viewing the world that is affected by culture. But, as we shall see, we ought to submit our subjective view to what is objectively true.

CRT further holds that American society as a whole—since it was created during the height of racism, white supremacy, and chattel slavery—is founded on racist principles (even if they are not explicitly racist) and therefore must be deconstructed. CRT works to deconstruct not only explicitly racist laws (that was mostly accomplished in the civil rights movement) but also what they deem as implicitly racist laws.

Since inequality of outcome between races continues to exist at substantial rates, CRT holds that the system or structure itself must be deconstructed until equity of outcomes is achieved. The claim to neutrality made by the Constitution and other laws is a facade, persistent in order to further racism and keep the powerful in power.

What is Critical Race Theory critical of?

One great threat, according to CRT, is the idea of measuring success based on “merit,” as capitalism claims to achieve. The fact that people who succeed in America do so on the principle of neutral merit is only a cover for powerful people retaining power—in this case, primarily white Americans.

For example, our Associate Editor had an excellent education in the classics, developed his writing skills from an early age, had tailored teaching to his personal needs, had ample free time to develop debate and speech skills, had connections to places through his middle class, well-connected family, and had people who supported him through college. CRT would identify his success as largely due to “white privilege” rather than merit.

CRT sees racism and power struggles in everyday situations. It is convinced that change must continue in the fields of history, sociology, politics, and literary criticism to uncover the roots of racism in society as it exists today. A complete and utter overhaul is required, with the measure of success being equitable outcomes. Its agenda is immediate: putting things off or playing the “long game” is considered ceding power to the dominant group.

The difficulty here is “where to stop.”

For instance, Kendi suggests including a new amendment in the constitution that gives power to a new branch of government that monitors racial equality. Kendi also says to be an anti-racist one must also be “anti-capitalist.” Most consider themselves patriots (like Crenshaw); others hold deep animosity against America and want to rebuild from scratch.

Remember, CRT purports that knowledge isn’t neutral; what matters is action and practice. So, to understand whether an idea is good, we must consider whether my belief has subjective merit and creates practical change toward liberation and equity, and not whether it makes a claim that matches with an independent reality.

Fundamentally, according to CRT, humanity’s problem is oppression. And the source of this oppression is in the dominant group’s policies and social norms (what is “normal” and “not normal”).

CRT proponents would extrapolate this and say that this sort of thinking infects law, religion, schooling, and American culture. Indeed, any belief is tainted by prejudices like these. Remember, intentions hardly matter according to CRT. It is action or inaction that counts for everything.

In fact, this is a huge source of confusion for “outsiders” to CRT. The definition of racism is an action that leads to unequal outcomes—not intentions. That means that I can be racist without ever intending or voicing racism, according to CRT. This is simply a definitional difference we must be aware of.

Examples of Critical Race Theory

Let’s examine cases of Critical Race Theory in action. Not every CRT advocate would necessarily agree with all of these examples as indicative of CRT, but they show real-world examples of the worldview in action.

American history

A great deal of ink has been spilled over America’s founding in reference to CRT. The most prominent work is The 1619 Project, which claims that racism and slavery are fundamental parts of the founding of America. In the past, historians and history textbooks have played down the role of race and slavery.

Traditional history in recent decades has been that slavery was a contradiction between the Founding Fathers’ ideals and their actions. Even the “father of CRT,” legal scholar Derrick Bell, wrote to this effect in And We Are Not Saved.

Instead of this narrative, CRT often claims that the entire American experiment must be suspect due to its origins.

This shows an example of history being influenced by white supremacy and racism. If this is true, the next natural question for many CRT proponents is how much of the Constitution is implicitly racist?

Here, we are not making strong judgments about these debates of history, or the various narratives, though it seems correct that some textbooks in the past have downplayed or ignored racism, the Civil War, and slavery, which are certainly a substantial part of this country’s history.

Diversity and inclusion training

For a time, companies everywhere promoted mandatory inclusion and diversity training. And while many have since moved away from doing so, such classes remain a divisive issue.

For instance, some social scientists argue that these programs usually do the opposite of their intended purpose. The mandatory programs normally make racial tensions worse. Nonetheless, the importance for these companies to be seen doing something boils over from CRT. And some CRT advocates, like White Fragility’s Dr. Robin DiAngelo, teach diversity training as part of their profession.

Whether it is effective or not, the “Diversity Equity Inclusion” business sector equals about $8 billion.

American law

Many have argued that Reagan’s “war on drugs,” which at some level persists in American law today, was implicitly racially motivated to keep black people in poverty. The way the laws were constructed, according to CRT, targeted African Americans and people of color.

For example, some argue that targeting cocaine (a drug that black people tended to abuse) as opposed to heroin (which white people tended to abuse) was implicitly racist. Defenders of Reagan will say it is because of cocaine’s particularly destructive nature that it was targeted.

Or take the “broken windows theory” of policing as another example. That approach says if you target minor crimes (like breaking windows), the environment will be better, and people will be less encouraged to commit crimes. This has sometimes been cited as giving excuses to police to target people of color.

While The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander makes these arguments based on statistics and evidence, many people of color consider this obvious based on their lived experience. This is one of many strains of racist bias that keep people of color in a cycle of poverty.

The criminal justice system and policing

Again, in The New Jim Crow, Alexander argues that while it is the job of the police to bring criminals to justice, the widespread practice of heavily policing impoverished, inner-city areas comprising mostly people of color selectively ignores the crimes that take place in white-majority suburbs and “white collar” crimes. This discrepancy supposedly shows that, while most would say justice is “blind” in America, it is an example of how the criminal justice system cannot be neutral, even though it claims to be. And, according to CRT, this discrepancy has a neutral “cover” but is an example of systemic racism.

More prominently, the Black Lives Matter movement drew attention to George Floyd’s murder by Derrick Chauvin, a white police officer. Marches, protests, and some riots across the nation called for awareness and systemic change in policing practices. This included some demanding that police be “defunded” and to replace them with social workers and financial investment into the communities. Again, in this article, we are not making judgments about these policies but are trying to present CRT’s effects and arguments.

 What’s “normal” and “whiteness”

Until recently, Crayola identified peach color in their markers and crayons as “skin-color.” CRT would say that this is an example of the majority (whites) using their own standards as what is “normal.” Whites think of themselves not as “white” but simply as “normal.”

An important part of CRT is its deconstruction of “whiteness,” whose self-understanding emerged relatively recently. NPR released a podcast called “Seeing White.” The idea of “whiteness” separates “whites” from “everyone else,” and this implicit belief, nestled in what is “normal,” gives an easy road to white supremacy.

Is Critical Race Theory Marxist?

While the real-world applications of Critical Race Theory discussed above can help us understand what it often looks like in practice, an increasingly relevant portion of the debate surrounds the question of whether CRT is necessarily tied to Marxism or whether there is room to separate the two systems of belief.

Answering this question does not warrant a simple yes or no. Rather, we will take this opportunity to explore the similarities and differences between Marxism and Critical Race Theory in the hope that this discussion will provide depth and clarity to an otherwise confusing, heated, and partisan debate.

First, here is a brief argument.

• Marxism says that society is split between the oppressed and the oppressors. Marxism focuses on material wealth and the power it confers on the upper class in a capitalist society. This power is always used to oppress the lower class. The solution is abolishing private property.
• Critical Theory says that society is split between oppressors and the oppressed, but social power also defines those boundaries. The majority group defines what is “normal,” and any morality that restricts minorities’ freedom is therefore oppression.
• Critical Race Theory builds on this and says that, in America, white people continue to oppress minorities, not necessarily through individual prejudice, but because they hold more wealth and impose what is “normal” on minorities.

Therefore, one can draw parallels between CRT and Marxism.

As I noted previously, it’s helpful to distinguish between the worldview of CRT and that of its followers. The often cynical, truth-abandoning worldview of CRT shares roots with the worldview of  Marxism because they both believe that society is always split between the oppressed and the oppressor and that life revolves around this power split. So, when CRT provides an ideological worldview perspective, it aligns closely with Marxism.

However, many scholars have other worldviews and use CRT like a microscope to examine problems rather than glasses through which everything is perceived. As such, CRT can be used as a tool to examine the problems of power abuse and racial inequality, but it must not become a lens through which everything is seen.

This is because much of CRT simply seeks greater equality between black and white Americans by studying history, sociology, and politics.

What is Marxism?

While this could be a long paper all by itself, we’ll just give the basics.

The Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels begins with these words: “The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles.” In other words, all of human history can be summarized as a conflict between classes of people competing for power.

Marxism argues that capitalism turns society into a “cold” calculation of efficiency. Capitalism extorts the underclass by using them as means to an end, turning working-class people into machines or “commodities.” Marxism argues that the way capitalism uses property benefits people in power (the bourgeoisie) far more than it benefits the lower class (the proletariat). So, per Marxism, private property needs to be abolished.

The Communist Manifesto says that when the upper class defends private property as protecting freedom, it is a “selfish misconception that induces [the bourgeoisie] to transform into eternal laws of nature and of reason, the social forms springing from [their] present mode.” In other words, selfishness by the upper class means that their ideals, like human rights and freedom, in the case of property at least, are actually just a subjective defense of their own power and abuse.

According to Marxism, so-called “eternal truths” like religion and morality are actually in constant flux. The “only fact” of history is oppression and power struggles. Anyone trying to talk about universal ideals (like religion, morality, or philosophy) is trying to take advantage of the lower class or wrest power from the upper class.

For instance, if someone says that democracy is the best kind of government, they are making a universal claim that democracy is best for the world. That kind of claim, according to Marxism, is inevitably used to oppress people.

What is Critical Theory?

To properly understand this question about Critical Race Theory, we must first examine Critical Theory (CT). CT began in the 1930s with Max Horkheimer, who founded the German school of thought known as the Frankfurt School of Philosophy. While this definition refers to Critical Theory in a narrow sense, any theory that critiques other ideas at its core can be considered a “critical theory,” e.g., feminism.

CT melded social science and philosophy, grounding its worldview in Marxism. CT posits that people act and believe according to power dynamics. While Marxism focuses on material wealth and private property, Critical Theory focuses on social standing and beliefs. As the name suggests, CT, as a theory, is critical of other philosophies, undermining them by suggesting that thinkers have ulterior motives that urge them to keep their own people in power.

We can imagine that each person has a kind of “social” privilege as a group, a concept called “hegemony.” It also states that knowledge is tainted by this never-ending social struggle for power and freedom from influence, because hegemony refers to the power that acceptance of ideas confers. For example, if 60 percent of Americans believe that everyone should be able to jaywalk, that idea’s acceptance could empower a politician who wants to make jaywalking legal. If a group of people has “idea-power,” that can help their social standing and give them hegemony.

To unpack that, let’s consider a parable.

Imagine a wolf giving an eloquent, thorough argument, supported by evidence and logic, that concludes he should protect an unprotected, innocent herd of sheep. He insists he’s being objective. At the end of his exposition, he also reasonably suggests that the herd must pay him one sheep to eat per day for his protection. He argues that he is more powerful according to the universal laws of nature; it’s just the way things are. No matter how rational his arguments are, at the end of the day, it’s simply a wolf eating sheep. And what can the sheep do about it? Unfair as it is, they must accept his terms.

No matter how forceful the upper-class arguments are, at the end of the day, it’s simply one group oppressing another.

For instance, a European, upper-class philosopher in the 1700s is going to argue that people of different cultures are inferior to his own, not because it is correct or because he’s drawing on an objective truth, but because it is advantageous to him and his tribe. It justifies colonizing and “civilizing” less developed peoples. Tragically, this argument was often made in defense of slavery.

Ideas that say certain values are universal and rational ultimately reinforce “existing social arrangements and convince the dominated classes that the existing order is inevitable,” as CRT scholar Kimberle Crenshaw puts it.

According to CT, so-called “objective” knowledge is therefore primarily used as a cover for the biased motives of people in power. This creation of an advantage isn’t necessarily intentional. CT holds that this can be subconscious or socially pressured through already-existing ways of thinking. That eighteenth-century philosopher may be convinced of his own objectivity, but it doesn’t change the fact that his beliefs are biased.

It’s not as though they believe that “objective” or “universal” as a label is most often wrongly used to cover up a lie; they actually believe that there is no such thing as disinterested, neutral knowledge. Truth develops with societies. The eighteenth-century European philosopher isn’t objectively incorrect according to CT. He is instead “wrong” only insofar as his views violate other people’s freedom.

By nature, the underclass must overthrow the overclass. It is an eternal conflict, just like according to Marxism. In principle, those in power protect their interests. This means that, like Marxism, CT splits everyone into either the oppressed or the oppressor because those in power will always oppress those without power.

As a result, all social problems are tied to oppression, and, crucially, no belief is neutral.

Is there such a thing as biblical critical theory? 

This notion that “no belief is neutral” has some merit. After all, our hearts are desperately deceitful, and indeed Paul speaks of our war being against worldly ideas—the dark powers embedded in our culture and institutions. Jesus critiqued the religious elites of his day. Ancient prophets in Israel were figures of resistance against the powerful majority.

In short, some tenets of critical theory align closely with the Bible. Especially, I would argue, the idea that “might does not make right.” Now, critical theory, as we’ve shown, has no place for absolute truth in its worldview (or worldviews). However, its critique of hidden motivations and hypocrisy in a culture’s elites or social rules in any society is a technique often used by the Bible.

In short, critical theory is about deconstruction, and the Bible deconstructs culture all the time—it just has the truth and real freedom found in Christ to construct as well.

So, as long as we maintain our hold on absolute truth, personified in Jesus, Christians can “do” critical theory. And that’s precisely what Dr. Christopher Watkin accomplishes in Biblical Critical Theory. As I discussed in my review of his sprawling but accessible volume, he unpacks the cultural view of any subject as two extremes. He shows how the Bible “diagonalizes” the two extremes (deconstructing them) and reveals a third, surprising Christ-centered truth that undercuts the cultural philosophies.

I give the example of determinism and free will in my review.

In Dr. Waktin’s analysis, the biblical way isn’t always “in the middle” or “balanced”; instead, the Bible usually shows a third, sometimes seemingly paradoxical, approach.

For example, Dr. Watkin unpacks two polarities in Western culture: the position of (1) determinism, instinct, evolution, and appetite on one side and (2) the ideal of absolute freedom, self-determination, and pure reason on the other.

He then “diagonalizes” the biblical response: “God’s sovereignty is the condition of possibility of my responsibility.”

While this approach is immensely helpful, it’s not new. Dr. Watkin stands on the shoulders of giants like St. Augustine, G.K. Chesterton, Charles Taylor, and C.S. Lewis in his academic, orthodox critique. So critical theory can be co-opted by Christians, though perhaps it’s better to say we’ve been doing something like it for thousands of years already.

What is unique about Critical Theory?

In The Coming Tsunami, Dr. Jim Denison writes: “In line with Marxist teaching, critical theorists view morality and human nature through the lens of social constructs. In their view, the shared interests of an oppressor class constrain and determine reality to a very high degree. Those who prosper have, by definition, organized the social order so as to exploit others and benefit themselves. Almost every social problem we face is therefore the fault of an oppressor class.”

So, CT applied Marxist thinking not only to economics as a social construct but also to anything else that a society defines socially or legally. A few examples, according to them, are sexuality, race, sex, science, and politics (see Horkheimer’s Traditional and Critical Theory and Marcuse in Eros and Civilization).

At the center of CT is the unification of action and theory. CT is not merely descriptive; by its own standards, it must instigate social change that moves the oppressed toward emancipation and freedom.

Due to the nature of the philosophy, CT mostly defines itself in opposition to other theories and ideas, without any care to offer its own unified, positive views of reality, except that, generally, we should always move forward, toward liberation and freedom.

This school of thought continued to develop throughout the twentieth century, strongly influencing Europe and America. Herbert Marcuse, a CT thinker, even worked in the US government during WWII.

Christianity also falls under this sweeping critique. Since Christians comprise the majority of America (and, for a while, Europe too), and we make objective truth claims about human nature (e.g., “God created only two sexes, male and female), CT, therefore, casts biblical Christians as oppressors on the basis of its claims to moral objectivity.

As a good real-world example of this philosophy playing out at a cultural level, CT philosophers would say that the Christian claim that marriage should be between one man and one woman is a fine claim for Christians. But, to say that it’s true for all people is wrong, and that’s an example of the majority (heterosexual Christians) justifying their oppression of the minority homosexual population.

Is Critical Race Theory Marxist?

First, we’ll begin with an often-said phrase by Dr. Jim Denison: “When I say Marxist, I don’t necessarily mean that in a pejorative sense.” If Critical Race Theory is, in some ways, Marxist, that does not make it wrong in and of itself. Critical Theory undeniably draws from Marxism.

So, how about Critical Race Theory? Is this application of CT Marxist?

America was founded (on principle, if not in practice) as an egalitarian country. This means that it does not promise “happiness,” it promises the “pursuit of happiness.” It promises that each citizen’s rights will be protected. It does not promise equal starting points, and it certainly does not promise equal outcomes. At the same time, it claims to protect the natural rights of each individual. Among them is private property.

According to CRT, this system sounds like a great setup if you have a good starting point. And that “if not in practice” caveat I gave is also what CRT focuses on, since African Americans were generally viewed as an inferior race, and many were enslaved at that time.

As discussed previously, Marxism holds that societies are generally built on a distinction between the oppressed and the oppressors, such that the majority are by definition oppressors. And this argument is often used by proponents of CRT. But Marxism focuses on material wealth and is far more radical in its calls for revolution.

According to CRT, since white people overwhelmingly hold the most wealth in America and have a higher social standing as a group, white people also hold the most power. This is true (a) because white people make up the majority, (b) because it is entrenched in the culture, and (c) because white people have higher wealth on average. This is demonstrated by evidence of persistent gaps between races in America.

And a fundamental supposition of CRT is that those in power serve their own interests. Therefore, the white majority, which holds most of the power (socially and monetarily), will not easily relinquish that power. This is one of the central tenets of CRT, as outlined in Critical Race Theory: An Introduction.

Therefore, if we protect the status quo with the veil of capitalism or meritocracy (everyone gets a proportion equal to the results of their work), then we are preserving the people group that already has the advantaged starting point: white people.

This is why the main proponents of CRT say that capitalism is an entrenched enemy of racial equality. This includes Ibram X. Kendi and Derrick Bell.

For instance, in And We Are Not Saved, Bell imagines a black, female civil rights lawyer traveling back in time to appear before the founding fathers as they are enacting the “three-fifths compromise.” This amendment said that black men were counted as only three-fifths of a citizen when determining taxation and voting weight for each state.

In the story, she debates with the founding fathers and hears their side. The conclusion of the tale is that while most had tendencies of racial prejudice, it was not at the center of most of the founders’ motivations. Instead, they were primarily motivated by practical, economic reasons. In other words, the so-called practical benefit of capitalism is precisely what continued racist slavery. Yes, it was actually racist beliefs against black people as well, but the main motivator was pragmatism, not ill will.

At the end of this brilliantly written work, Bell shows that the only hope for black Americans to end racism would be to join impoverished white Americans to fight for a new vision of equality. In a way, Bell’s vision becomes not about ending “racism” per se but about diminishing the capitalism he believes keeps black Americans in the status quo position, which is overrepresented in poverty and underrepresented in the wealthy. So, it seems that a natural next step for Bell is toward undercutting capitalism and furthering socialism. This is at least one major lesson of the book, if not the only one.

Bell writes, “Both history and experience tell us that each new victory over injustice both removes a barrier to racial equality and reveals another obstacle that we must, in turn, grapple with and—eventually—overcome.” In other words, unless everyone is equal in power, there will always be the oppressed and the oppressor. And that reveals CT’s influence.

Additionally, Ibram X. Kendi writes that to be “anti-racist” is to be “anti-racist capitalist.” While he doesn’t argue for abolishing free markets or property altogether, he does believe in redistributing wealth to end large discrepancies until blacks and whites are on relatively equal footing economically. Insofar as capitalism is opposed to that, it is racist. He is also for “anti-racist discrimination,” meaning discrimination is good, but only if it adds more to black Americans and helps tip the scales to equal balance.

Is all of Critical Race Theory Marxist?

No, not all of Critical Race Theory is Marxist. Since CRT also examines social norms, it most often has little to do with Marxism (which concerns only material wealth), except that both critique society.

Additionally, CRT often reexamines American history. And it’s not necessarily Marxist to say that unbridled capitalism fostered slavery, or, if it is, it’s a Marxist observation that seems plausible.

Indeed, many parts of CRT are not inherently Marxist. Even if CRT is heavily influenced by Marxism, that does not mean we should reject all of CRT. Some of Marxism seems to have been a good critique of the capitalist society of that day. For instance, greed motivated many companies to use child labor, taking advantage of the desperation of the poor.

It’s important to note that while Marxism may not be all evil, the utter failure of communist, Marxist states in the twentieth century directly led to the deaths of tens of millions of people. It’s hard to overstate the misery and destruction that Marxism has caused.

All of that to say, while CRT advocates certainly critique capitalism as a large part of America’s past and continued racism, most do not want to completely abolish property. Nor do they necessarily want to establish a Marxist state. Many, however, are striving toward Marxist ideals of equality of outcomes, with the focus on group identity.

In Kendi’s case, for instance, this does not mean we should have everyone take equal pay, but that anti-racist policy should mean policies that would decrease the wealth gap between black and white Americans.

So, is Critical Race Theory Marxist?

At the end of the day, it is undeniable that Critical Race Theory is closely tied to the philosophy of Critical Theory, and Critical Theory draws heavily on Marxism by asserting that people exist in unavoidable oppressor-oppressed relationships.

So, in a very general, philosophical sense, CRT draws from Marxism. Most CRT advocates either deny these ties or remain silent about them. Many will say that searching for connections is a witch hunt or a red herring. But we think that intellectual honesty demands that we recognize their ties and believe it can help us, as Americans, to determine what’s good and right.

CRT is also not Marxist in some key ways.

CRT adherents almost never advocate for the abolition of property, and they focus on social issues, not just economic ones. Some draw on CRT simply to critique how American society can be built better, with greater equality across racial lines. They study history, sociology, and politics to work for a better solution. Many CRT advocates are religious, whereas Marxism says religion is “the opium of the masses.” Many CRT proponents consider themselves patriots, like Crenshaw.

While there is room for debate in these areas, many areas of CRT are simply not Marxist. There is the ideological CRT, which is cynical and rejects any claim to universal value, stating that America is divided along oppressor and oppressed, and that group identity is the only way to see things. That version of CRT is more akin to Marxism and is indeed dangerous.

For many, however, CRT is simply a tool to show how inequality existed in America and still does to this day.

Is Critical Race Theory good or bad?

The main conclusion we must come to about CRT is that, like most theories, it is a mixed bag.

There are good ideas and bad ones—especially as regards public policy.

CRT correctly points out worrying discrepancies between people of color and white people, but how to tackle these problems in a beneficial way is complex. While there’s more we could say, for now, we hope this provides a solid, fresh start to understanding CRT. We’ve heard it so frequently in the news, and the issue has become deeply politicized, that it’s becoming impossible to hear a clear definition. Hopefully, this provides a balanced understanding of CRT and where it does (and doesn’t) fit within a biblical worldview.

 

Denison Forum