Nilesh Jasani's Reviews > The Sum of Us: What Racism Costs Everyone and How We Can Prosper Together

A lot of arguments in The Sum of Us are highly debatable. The author's extreme takes convert numerous inequality, corporate greed, and electoral system rigidities into race issues which is at least partly driven by the author's politics. The solutions - also reflective of the author's political and economic leanings - do not attempt to solve the inherent racism issues as much as issues of the other realms. Ideally, these non-racism issues should be debated separately for the proponents and opponents to argue the pros and cons more dispassionately.

All that said, the book refuses to pull any punches in throwing light on the topic the privileged want only to gloss over. Through discussions that often turn extreme, it covers the well-trodden grounds and exposes issues from other realms having outcomes that perpetuate and reinforce the racial divides. They are issues of inequality, corporate greed, and electoral system rigidities, which now intersect with and exacerbate issues of racism.

All humanitarians should read this book carefully, even if they are not from the United States or from vastly different economic or political schools compared to the author.