Author: Justin C. Mueller

“Herrenvolk democracy” basically means social democracy for the favored race as a way not of expanding liberty to all citizens but only to the accepted in-group, people like us as the white majority.” – Rick Perlstein Herrenvolk democracy is a crucial concept for understanding the potential racial dimension of democratic belonging and exclusion within a political body, as well as the inequalities of power, rights, and resources that follow. Coined by Pierre van den Berghe, a Herrenvolk democracy is a political order that is “democratic for the master race but tyrannical for subordinate groups” (p.18). There is equality, but...