““The central premise of racism, which distinguishes it from ethnic prejudice, is the notion of an ordered hierarchy of races in which some are superior to others. The superior race is assumed to enjoy the right to rule others because of its inherent qualities. Besides superiority, racism also connotes the idea of immutability, thought once to reside in the blood and now in the genes. Racists are concerned about intermarriage (“the purity of the blood”) lest it erode the basis of their race’s superiority. Since quality is seen as biologically inherent, the racist’s higher status can never be challenged, and inferior races can never redeem themselves. The notion of inherent superiority, which is generally absent from mere ethnic prejudice, is held to justify unlimited abuse of races held to be inferior, from social discrimination to annihilation. “The essence of racism is that it regards individuals as superior or inferior because they are imagined to share physical, mental and moral attributes with the group to which they are deemed to belong, and it is assumed that they cannot change these traits individually,” writes the historian Benjamin Isaac.2 It’s not surprising that the notion of racial superiority emerged in the 19th century, after European nations had established colonies in much of the world and sought a theoretical justification of their dominion over others.””
