White Privilege

• Pages: 245-264
• Author: Khiara M. Bridges

245

Chapter 11

WHITE PRIVILEGE

One of the most frequently cited definitions of white privilege

comes from feminist educator Peggy McIntosh, whose essay on the

topic brought the term into common usage. In her essay, McIntosh

describes white privilege as “an invisible package of unearned assets

which I can count on cashing in each day, but about which I was

‘meant’ to remain oblivious. White privilege is like an invisible

weightless backpack of special provisions, maps, passports,

codebooks, visas, clothes, tools and blank checks.”

1

McIntosh’s

description of white privilege suggests that simply being white is an

advantage. It makes goals more accessible. It makes harms more

avoidable. While it does not ensure that every white person will win,

it makes it harder for them to lose.

Critical thinkers about race have argued that the concept of

white privilege does not index a new or unexpected phenomenon. If

one believes that racial hierarchies exist, then it is fairly

unremarkable to note that those hierarchies will benefit some to the

detriment of others. As Professors Devon Carbado and Mitu Gulati

put it, the claim that white privilege exists “is nothing more than a

claim about the existence of discrimination. . . . To the extent that

race discrimination is a current social problem, there will be victims

and beneficiaries of this discrimination. The former are

disadvantaged; the latter are privileged.”

2

Thus, white privilege is

just a term for the spoils of racial hierarchy: White privilege is what

white supremacy begets.

3

In her essay, McIntosh identifies several examples of white

privilege, ranging from the arguably minor and insignificant to the

profound and consequential. She writes that, as a white person:

• When I am told about our national heritage or about

“civilization,” I am shown that people of my color made

it what it is.

1

Peggy McIntosh, White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack, PEACE &

FREEDOM MAG., July/Aug. 1989, at 10.

2

Devon Carbado & Mitu Gulati, The Law and Economics of Critical Race

Theory, 112 YALE L.J. 1757, 1777 (2003).

3

See john a. powell, Whites Will Be Whites: The Failure to Interrogate Racial

Privilege, 34 U.S.F. L. REV. 419, 420 (2000) (noting that he prefers to call “White racial

privilege” “White supremacy”).

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WHITE PRIVILEGE

Ch. 11

• I do not have to educate my children to be aware of

systemic racism for their own daily physical protection.

• I can worry about racism without being seen as self-

interested or self-seeking.

• I can take a job with an affirmative action employer

without having my co-workers on the job suspect that

I got it because of my race.

• I can choose blemish cover or bandages in ‘flesh’ color

and have them more or less match my skin.

• I can be late to a meeting without having the lateness

reflect on my race.

4

Those who believe that white privilege exists would propose that

McIntosh’s list is just the tip of the iceberg. They might add to it,

observing that white people have an easier time securing loans than

people of color; moreover, the terms of the loans that white people

secure tend to be more favorable than those secured by people of

color.

5

White people are much more likely than people of color to get

from point A to point B, whether driving or walking, without police

stopping them.

6

Black women die three to four times more often than

white women from a pregnancy-related cause;

7

black babies die twice

more often in their first year of life than white babies.

8

Homes in

white neighborhoods are worth more than comparable homes in

nonwhite neighborhoods;

9

white children get to attend better schools

as a direct consequence.

10

A significant portion of people in the U.S.

think that efforts to disestablish what progressives believe to be the

existing racial hierarchy, like race-based affirmative action, are

equivalent to efforts to erect and protect that same hierarchy;

further, the Court has constructed a jurisprudence that reflects that

4

McIntosh, supra note 1, at 11.

5

Drew Desilver & Kristen Bialik, Black and Hispanics Face Extra Challenges

in Getting Home Loans, PEW RSCH. CTR. (Jan. 10, 2017), http://www.pewresearch.org/

fact-tank/2017/01/10/blacks-and-hispanics-face-extra-challenges-in-getting-home-

loans/.

6

Chapter 19 delves into race and policing.

7

Theresa Chalhoub & Kelly Rimar, The Health Care System and Racial

Disparities in Maternal Mortality, CTR. FOR AM. PROGRESS, (May 10, 2018), https://cdn.

americanprogress.org/content/uploads/2018/05/09121820/HealthSystemDisparitiesIn

MaternalMortality-Brief.pdf; Latoya Hill et al., Racial Disparities in Maternal and

Infant Health: Current Status and Efforts to Address Them, KFF (Oct. 25, 2024),

https://www.kff.org/racial-equity-and-health-policy/issue-brief/racial-disparities-in-

maternal-and-infant-health-current-status-and-efforts-to-address-them/.

8

Hill, et al., supra note 7.

9

Nancy A. Denton, The Role of Residential Segregation in Promoting and

Maintaining Inequality in Wealth and Property, 34 IND. L. REV. 1199, 1207 (2001).

10

Chapter 21 explores race and education.