The Anatomy of Racial Inequality. (nonfiction reviews).

The Anatomy of Racial Inequality by Glenn C. Loury Harvard University Press, February 2002 $22.95, ISBN 0-674-00626-7

It's the quintessential story of the wayward son---or in this case, wayward black intellectual--coming back home. The Anatomy of Racial Inequality continues the reclamation of neo-conservative Glenn Loury's grudging transition to the left, albeit nowhere near the political likes of many of his African-American academic contemporaries. Though Loury's transformation began with One By One From the Inside Out: Essays and Reviews on Race and Responsibility in America in 1995, in this book he lays claim to ideologies that would have been anathema during his days as the resident black scholar in ultra-conservative think tanks during the Reagan years. Here he proposes the idea that "racial stigma" is what plagues African Americans rather than racial discrimination, effectively thwarting black progress. While that may be true, it is little consolation given the daily assaults of racial bias.

Loury's real-life story is a classic tale of falling from grace and redemption: conservative, black, Harvard professor becomes victim to drug addiction, a paternity suit and marital woes, which eventually force him to resign his position. Ultimately, he finds himself, and resurrects his career after an evangelical transformation.

Unfortunately, little of that spiritual catharsis comes through in Loury's essays, which were delivered as part of the W.E.B. DuBois lecture series at Harvard. Perhaps it is his reliance on the overly rigid language of an economist that constricts his work. He concludes rather dryly in Anatomy of Racial Inequality, "Discrimination is about how people are treated; stigma is about who, at the deepest cognitive level, they are understood to be."

I suspect Glenn Loury's book would resonate if it were more informed by his own personal experience.

--Evette Porter is the executive editor of BIBR.