Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Caste, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Caste, Race, and Social Division in the U.S.
Caste as a Global Problem
How Caste Sustains Itself
The Costs of Caste
Summary
Analysis
On New Year’s Eve 2015, Wilkerson attended a gathering of political insiders in Washington D.C. There, she confided in the legendary Black journalist Gwen Ifill that she felt the celebrity billionaire running for president had a chance at winning—largely because of white Americans’ fears of becoming the country’s minority by 2042. Ifill agreed—the billionaire had a shot. As 2016 unfolded, Wilkerson continued to believe he might win, even as those around her insisted that the U.S. would never let such a thing happen.
This passage references Donald Trump’s presidential run—a run that many people considered a long shot. But people like Ifill and Wilkerson—who belonged to the subordinate caste—knew that anyone who stoked the dominant caste’s fears about their threatened social status would surely win them over.
Themes
Caste, however, is a perfectly reasonable explanation for the ascendancy of Donald Trump to the highest office in the country. White voters across the U.S. were willing to risk anything to preserve what they valued most: their role as the dominant caste in the country. The desire to protect their collective interests and waning status motivated white Americans to cast their votes in such a way that would “reassert a racial order” that placed their group at the top. While many lamented that white Republicans were voting against their own interests, they were, in fact voting in favor of the only interest that mattered to them: white supremacy and the protection of caste hierarchy.
The 2016 election was a “turning point” in the U.S., as this chapter’s title suggests, because it represented a moment when members of the dominant caste broadcasted their desire for a return to caste’s control over everyday life. Leaders like Trump, whom Wilkerson suggests appealed to white voters’ anxieties about losing power and influence, emboldened members of the dominant caste to make racist and casteist statements about their longing for caste’s subordination of Black people.
Themes
Those living in a caste system will do whatever it takes to survive within it. So, in 2016, white voters who perceived a threat to their survival and their domination acted in “white solidarity” by electing Trump. Meanwhile, Democrats focused on winning Republican voters—a lost cause—while ignoring the subordinate caste that has historically made up a consistent section of their voter base. White evangelicals rallied around Trump, who they believed would preserve their “white Protestant nation.” Ultimately, 62 percent of white men and 53 percent of white women voted for Trump. Meanwhile, 94 percent of Black women and 82 percent of Black men voted for Hillary Clinton, the Democratic candidate.
By dissecting the demographics of the 2016 election in the U.S., the book suggests that white voters rallied around a candidate whom they believed would restore their dominance and protect the “purity” of their caste.
Themes
