The Critical Racialization of Parents' Rights

Abstract

In the aftermath of the global protests against White supremacy in the summer of 2020, conservative operatives mobilized to resist race-conscious demands for racial justice. Under the banner of a caricatured account of Critical Race Theory (CRT), between January 2021 and December 2022, government officials at all levels across the country, in red states and blue states, introduced over 560 bills, regulations, resolutions, and policies to restrict teaching about and raining on contemporary racial injustice or the effects of historical subordination. In this Feature, I argue that we cannot understand the explosive growth of the anti-CRT movement without understanding how parents’ rights over education have historically been and continue to be racialized. Indeed, the anti-CRT movement has built on and been intertwined with the trend toward parents’ rights, which complains that official educational policies usurp fundamental parental rights.

I argue that the “twin” movements against CRT and for parents’ rights legally and culturally enshrine colorblindness and innocence to resist and reverse any claims for or efforts to achieve racial justice. Despite the claims that both movements represent concerns of all parents and children, both center White parents’ rights and the protection of White children. To support these assertions, I present data from a unique database of anti-CRT activity and contemporary parents’ rights mobilization.

This Feature adds to the CRT literature on racial reform and retrenchment, especially regarding schools. It examines a relatively unexplored intersection of Critical Race Theory, parents, and educational policy. I contend that the racially regressive ways in which White parents, historically and presently, use their status as parents reflect not only an impulse to protect their children through asserting control over education, but to protect Whiteness.

Keywords: critical race theory, education, parents

JEL Classification: critical race theory, education, parents