Bad Faith and the Culture War retraces recent campaigns against “wokeness” to a convergence of colorblind ideologies that insidiously entrench traditional racism beneath a veneer of “common sense.”

Probing interconnections between legal originalism, cultural invocations of “Western tradition,” and reactionary backlash to Critical Race Theory and antiracist activism, Amien Kacou devises an eclectic political psychology approach that exposes how appeals to neutrality, heritage, and the need to protect children from corruption conspire to conceal profound commitments to the color line. Each chapter analyzes a distinct mode of colorblind rhetoric (projective, equivocal, hysterical, and obsessive-compulsive) to show how these patterns distort antiracist efforts and help stabilize broader existing hierarchies of “citizenship.” By bringing a very large array of philosophical concepts, social sciences studies, and literary references into conversation with caselaw and current events, the book reveals the continued shortcomings of classical liberal racial idealism in the face of evolving resistance to meaningful social justice.