Racism is a term that has been contaminated and overused over time. It has a complexity of meaning and usage. The twentieth century has witnessed the manipulation of the concept of racism into a term of political abuse; various users have continuously used and manipulated the concept to suit their political agendas (Miles 1989; Wieviorka 1995). The many concepts of racism that have been established have made it difficult to theorise the concept; 'The concept of racism has come to be used to refer not only to imagery and assertions, but also to practices, procedures and outcomes, often independent of human intentionality and a specific ideological content' (Miles 1989:3). While social scientists have restricted its meaning to retain its analytical value, political activists have extended its meaning to use the term as a political weapon in ideological warfare (Levinson & Ember 1996: 1054). As a resu

Miles proposes that the commonality which binds all forms of racism together is that each constitutes an ideology (Miles 1989: 42). That is, racism is an ideology that takes a number of different forms. Although the concept of ideology is also contested, Miles generally defines it as relating to 'any discourse which, as a whole, represents human beings and the social relations between human beings in a distorted and misleading manner' (Miles 1989: 42). Thus ideology is a specific form of discourse. Miles criticises earlier definitions of racism as 'false doctrine' as this fails to appreciate the fact that ideologies can successfully make sense of the world, at least for those who articulate and use them (Miles 1989: 80). Put another way, the ideology of racism can constitute for some sections of a population a description of and explanation for the way in which the world is experienced to work. For example, the falsity of the ideology of capitalism legitimised the real material difference between populations and classes living within a single world economic system dominated by the capitalist mode of production (Miles 1989: 2, 81). More specifically, capitalism generates social inequality by openly contradicting the principles of equality and universalism that legitimate capitalism (McLellan 1987: 12). Hence, the ideology of racism attempts to explain the subordination of specific populations who become victims of inequality by the exploitation of their labour through the payment of low wages (McLellan 1987: 12). Thus in this context, what made capitalism ideological was that it concealed the real nature of social and economic relationships and thus served to justify the unequal distribution of social and economic resources in society (Mc Lellan 1987: 12). In light of the contradictory consequences of capitalism, Miles argues that the ideology of racism can successfully make sense of the world and thereby provide a strategy for political action for sections of different classes.

If the concept of racism is then more narrowly defined as a representational or ideological phenomenon what are its primary defining characteristics? Miles (1989) argues that the distinguishing content of racism as ideology is, first, its signification of some biological characteristics by which a collectivity may be identified. In this way, the collectivity is represented as having a natural and unchanging origin and status, and therefore as being inherently different. In reference to this first characteristic, Miles argues that racism is essentially a process of signification (Miles 1989: 70-72). That is, meaning is attributed to certain physical or biological characteristics of human beings to create a human hierarchy, and subsequently negatively attributed characteristics are attributed to each category or level of the hierarchy. Such a hierarchy is then used in the allocation of services and resources to the groups (Miles 1993: 23). More specifically, the signification of such physical characteristics play a considerable role in the selection of people for particular economic positions and in the exclusion of people from the advantages or privileges such as economic rewards and political rights (Miles 1989: 3).

Today racism is used to describe many forms of hatred, contempt, rejection or discrimination (Wieviorka 1995: 2). As such the earlier definitions of racism, namely 'institutional' and 'scientific' would have limited applicability to the many forms of racism that exist today. It very much seems that any definition of racism is solely dependent on the context in which it is to be found (Payne 1996). It has been suggested that perhaps then it is wise to conclude then that the use of racism as an analytical concept has become so pre-empted by its abuse in the moral and ideological domain that it is best left to the academics to determine its range of meanings in a wide variety of contexts (Levinson & Ember 1996). Al

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