Class, race and ethnicity: a critique of Cox's theory.

The article presents a critique of Oliver Cromwell Cox's text, "Caste, Class and Race," which was first published in 1948 and 30 years later is still regarded as the classic Marxist analysis of race relations. Cox would not have denied that he was writing under the influence of Karl Marx, but he was also concerned to produce a consistent sociological theory of race relations on a global scale. Cox asserts that there is an important analytical distinction between social class and political class. He believes that societies are not only stratified in terms of social and political class but also contain distinct peoples. When ethnics perceive their differences to be cultural, Cox argues that the resulting social relations be identified as nationality or minority group relations. He also stresses the historical and social specificity of race relations when distinguishing them from intolerance, ethnocentrism and racism. Cox argues that both national and racial ethnics are power groups, that is to say, they are both potential or actual antagonists, depending upon the degree of culture or race prejudice respectively. But his analysis almost imperceptibly shifts from a focus on race relations to a focus on race prejudice. The slip is not without theoretical consequences for it carries with it the implication that race relations only exist in context of the expression of racial antagonism.