Liberalism and Its Contradictions: Democracy and Hierarchy in Mestizaje and Genomics in Latin America

Abstract

This article explores Latin American genomic studies of mestizaje and the way mestizaje's inherent contradiction between equality and hierarchy-a contradiction typical of liberalism-is managed in genomics. In Latin America, ideologies and practices of mestizaje may be seen as an antidote to hierarchies of race and class, but also as a terrain for the enactment of these hierarchies. Mestizaje mediates this contradiction between equality and hierarchy first by deploying the idea of sexual intimacy and family kinship across racial difference, and second by representing blackness and indigeneity as spatially peripheral and temporally backward-looking, thus naturalizing them as other. Multiculturalism can be seen as a recent variant on these themes, as well as a departure from them. Recent genomics research in Latin America strongly reiterates these ideas, while also adding some new twists. Despite its apparent connection with progressive politics and policies (antiracism, better health for all, protection of human rights for victims of oppression), genomics here appears as a mainly conservative force.Este artículo aborda las investigaciones genómicas latinoamericanas del mestizaje y cómo la contradicción inherente del mestizaje entre la igualdad y la jerarquía-una contradicción típica del liberalismo-se maneja en la genómica. En América Latina las ideologías y prácticas del mestizaje pueden ser entendidas como un antídoto a las jerarquías de raza y clase, pero también como el terreno en el cual se reproducen estas jerarquías. El mestizaje media esta contradicción entre la igualdad y la jerarquía primero al usar la idea de que la intimidad sexual y el parentesco atraviesan las diferencias racializadas; y segundo al representar lo negro y lo indígena como espacialmente periféricos y temporalmente atrasados, de esta manera naturalizándolos como Otro. Se puede entender el multiculturalismo como una variante reciente de estos temas, así como una divergencia de ellos. En la ciencia genómica latinoamericana, investigaciones recientes reiteran fuertemente estas ideas, a la vez agregándoles nuevas acepciones. A pesar de su aparente vínculo con las políticas sociales progresivas (anti-racismo, mejor salud para todos, protección de los derechos humanos para las víctimas de la violencia), en este caso la genómica se presenta como una fuerza más que todo conservadora.In political orders governed by liberalism, there is a powerful tension between hierarchy and democratic egalitarianism. In this article, I argue that in Latin America, this tension is mediated in a specific way, via ideas and practices of mestizaje, which contain both the possibility of racial hierarchy and the possibility of its overcoming through racial democratization, a possibility that has been long highlighted by many intellectuals both inside and outside the region. These dual potentials are enacted by an emphasis on the sexual intimacy and familial aspect of mestizaje, which both de-emphasizes racial difference and hierarchy and acts as an arena for their r...

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