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Reading this book as a sociologist, I'm intrigued by Dalal's position on one hand, on the other impressed by the scope and breadth of this book. Dalal is writing from the position of a psychotherapist who has found much value in works of sociology to understand processes of racism and racialization. This is at a time when many sociologists and cultural theorists are turning to psychoanalysis to fill in yawning gaps left by more traditional forms of sociological and cultural analysis. It is, therefore, hard to situate the book within the current literature and context, but it would fit somewhere between the work of Rustin (1991), Elliott (2002), Craib (1989) in the field of psychoanalytic studies, my own work on the psychodynamics of racism (Clarke, 2003), and the classic psychodynamic/political economy approach of Frantz Fanon (1965, 1968). Yet the book is more elusive than this, probing into the sociology of racism, the psychoanalysis of racism, social psychological, and group relations perspectives and even semiotics. This is a tall order, and one starts to think that Dalal is trying to cover far too much - in effect everything that you ever wanted to know about racism and radicalization in one book. It works though and I feel that this book could be read as a stand alone text or a reference work. There is enough in the detail of each chapter to allow the student to follow up certain strands of thought without detracting from the style of the book as a monograph.
Dalal is clear in the introduction to this book that his thesis is as follows:
difference is not the cause of hatred, rather particular differences are called forth by the vicissitudes of power relations in order to organise hatreds (and other emotions) in order to achieve particular ends. (Dalal, , p. 7)
Race is one of these differences, relying on skin colour that is given the