Revisiting Arguments Advanced in the Declining Significance of Race

In his controversial book, "The Declining Significance of Race" (1978), scholar William Julius Wilson featured two major underlying themes: the effect of fundamental economic and political shifts on the changing relative importance of race and class as a determinant of a black person's life trajectory, and the swing in the concentration of racial conflict from the economic sector to the sociopolitical order. Wilson reflects on these themes and their application to more recent developments in American race and ethnic relations involving not only African Americans but also other groups, including whites and Latinos.