ABSTRACT
More than a half century ago, Gunnar Myrdal published the most troubling book yet about America and the subject of this conference [Workshop on Advancing the International Interests of African-Americans, Asian Americans, and Latinos, March 20-21, 1998, Los Angeles]. Entitled An American Dilemma, the study demonstrated the persistence of racial prejudice in American life and its impact on our institutions of governance, as well as the determination on the part of those disadvantaged to struggle to become more equal. That the societal and institutional practices that had prevented Americans of color from living in equality had not produced greater alienation was seen by social scientists of the time as allowing an interval-during which old practices would die out-between the end of World War II and the achievement of equality for all those who fought in it.
