Ethics Articles
Articles: Racism, Multiculturalism
>> = Important Articles; ** = Major Articles
Multiculturalism (David Warren, 031207)
Allegiances in a Multicultural Age (NRO, 011108)
Justice is not served by hate crime statute (National Post, 020722)
Reagan, Lott, and Race Baiting: Reviewing the record (NRO, 021219)
Hateful but harmless (National Post, 021218)
One Lord, One Faith, Many Ethnicities (Christianity Today, 031230)
Racism (Global Issues Website)
How white people can work for racial justice (Global Issues Website)
Canadian Multiculturalism: An Inclusive Citizenship (Heritage Canada)
Canadian Diversity: Respecting our Differences (Heritage Canada)
Standard Complaint: Fear of merit (NRO, 040603)
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It is interesting that “multiculturalism” was the British conqueror’s method of ruling in India and elsewhere. It made perfect sense in the old British Empire. A remarkably small number of British soldiers and administrators established themselves at the top of a social pyramid on a subcontinent seething with several hundred million souls, belonging to an extraordinary variety of races, colours, and creeds. The British notoriously, but instinctively, shuffled the interests of one group against another, while reshuffling themselves constantly back to the top.
Yet in both thought and action they kept themselves aloof from “the natives”. They were able to perform this ritual dance -- it required inventive costumes, too, and all kinds of ceremonial pomposities -- with less than one-tenth of the number of troops that the French required to hold down underpopulated Algeria. They were even hated less, when they left.
Of course, no dance can be continued forever, and eventually the British had to quit India, as eventually their progressive Anglophonic emulators may have to quit Canada. “Multiculturalism” remains a viable policy only as long as no one calls the bluff. But in the meantime the policy keeps a growing disorder superficially in order.
And while it lasts, it can be spectacularly impressive. The principle is, We rule, and They -- “the lesser breeds without the law” -- may get on with their little lives and breedings. We will intervene in their internal affairs only when they do something inconvenient to us, such as mutiny. The big test came in 1857, when the rulers realized the full cost of a minor administrative miscalculation.
A rather similar, though to my mind less genteel, version of this multicultural policy was developed by the Afrikaaner ruling class that emerged in South Africa, under the name of “apartheid”. This was the rough, frontier version, in which the proponents were actually planning to stay, and their pragmatic settlements policy degenerated into an ideology.
Through the accident of my upbringing, I am more familiar with the Indian case. Against the official multicultural procedures were pitted the Christian missionaries, determined to put an end to things like suttee (widow-burning), and honour-killings, and caste slavery, and so much else that didn’t look right to the inquiring Christian mind. The missionaries, going boldly into the field, created complications for the Raj, by messing in where officialdom was certain they did not belong.
For while the more seasoned agents of ye John Company might have been perfectly aware of “quaint local customs”, they were not even slightly mortified by them. Rather than trying to suppress what could be viewed as barbaric cultural solecisms, they looked upon them relativistically, as entertaining anecdotes to trade among themselves.
The contest of wills is similar in Canada today, though we came by our multiculturalism in the opposite way from the British Indian experience.
The British found all the variety of India ready-provided; whereas they had found Canada nearly empty, when they arrived here. Outside of Quebec, a distinctive British North American society was shaped and formed, into which new arrivals were assimilated. Only later did they -- or now, we -- turn what has been indelicately called an “immigration hose” on the product of our labours. Our Liberal Party discovered that by importing various exotic immigrant groups, and discouraging them from assimilating, they could create dependants -- pools from which to harvest reliable Liberal votes.
The formula, once again, is, “We rule, and They” ... can do pretty much anything they want, so long as it is compatible with, “We rule”. Master wouldn’t dream of intervening unless something is done that might undermine his place at the top, in which case all this cultural relativism goes quickly through a window.
The British rulers of India were appallingly post-Christian. They hated the missionaries not only because the missionaries did things inconvenient to the Raj, but also because they were “believers” -- a class of persons for whom “unbelievers” can have nothing but contempt. When you put yourself above everything, as the management of multiculturalism requires, you lose all your own religious sense of involvement. This is because all the spiritual questions that normally animate at least some part of a human soul must be externalized. At most you “referee” between groups, and your own “objectivity” is assured by your freedom from commitment to a religion, or a culture, or to anything except yourself.
The Anglican Church, which with a few impressive exceptions served Englishmen not natives (though it sometimes also escaped into the society through their servants), provided, for the most part, a pure social club for the ruling class. I caught a glimpse of such a church in my childhood in Lahore, which offered the quickest possible Sunday service, followed by a long and leisurely coffee clatch. It was the social club where the remaining “white folk” met on their day off. I sometimes think India was the place where the Mass was transformed into Sunday Brunch.
Whereas the powerless Catholics went building schools and missions and gener ally after the souls of all the native people. So that after a couple of centuries of British Anglican rule, far more of the Christians in India were Catholic. And so that even the vast numbers who were never converted were nevertheless touched by the Christian faith, to the alteration of many of their ancient customs -- even before the late twentieth century hit India as the Bollywood Express.
Same in Canada, though perhaps it has happened here the other way around. There probably is not a single Christian “believer” in Canada, regardless of confession, who embraces the multicultural policy. And it explains why we believer types get socially surrounded, in the traditional churches, by persons who are neither progressive nor white. Whereas, across the street in the progressive congregations, a diminishing number of Canada’s old Grit Raj, of almost purely wonderbread complexion, play at things like “gay marriage”.
The thought came full circle this last week, when I learned that our legal Raj is now prepared to grant Sharia law to their Muslim constituency. In civil disputes between Muslims in Canada, the parties may soon appeal to a Darul-Qada (judicial tribunal), where an Ulama will adjudicate, making a Koran-based judgement that will in turn become enforceable by our secular courts (unless overruled). And it is all presented as a natural thing, a further development of multiculturalism in our “evolving society”.
Rule Britannia!
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Discovering the dangers of worshipping tolerance
For the last decade or so, multiculturalism has been the reigning doctrine in Britain almost as much as in the U.S. A steady stream of official statements from New Labor ministers and think tanks have poured scorn on every traditional British institution from the House of Commons to the Changing of the Guard as outdated, snobbish, and unsuited to a country that is now home to many ethnic minorities. An official commission, inquiring into a murder by racist hooligans, diagnosed the polite British bobby as suffering from “institutionalized racism.” An unofficial commission, headed by a Labor peer, criticized the very concept of “Britishness” as inherently racist and exclusionary. And the entire corpus of monarchy, law, parliament and church is disparaged as “the ancien regime.”
In its place, New Labor ministers seek to “re-brand” the country as a modern, meritocratic, and multicultural country that places an equal value on the many different cultural traditions contributing to contemporary British life. Ethnic quotas are quietly spreading through the public sector; in schools “divisive” British history is sidelined in favor of a either a bland world history or one focused on the culture of local minorities; and the British people are being redefined by New Labor sympathizers as “a community of communities.” At times one has half expected Mr. Blair to issue a Declaration of Independence and denounce Elizabeth II for “a history of repeated injuries and usurpations.” But he has confined himself to upstaging the Queen on ceremonial occasions — notably her daughter-in-law’s funeral. Today, with a war looming, Mr. Blair needs to draw on the reserves of traditional British patriotism. But he has bumped up against one consequence of multiculturalism: Not everyone in the country regards Britain either as home or as the nation to which they owe allegiance.
In particular, an unknown number of British Muslims have volunteered to journey to Afghanistan and to fight on the side of Osama bin Laden and the Taliban against British troops. Last weekend four such British volunteers were killed in Afghanistan when U.S. bombs hit their building. And television screens have carried pictures of Muslim demonstrations against the Anglo-American bombing campaign, apparently taking place in some Middle Eastern setting which, on closer examination, turned out to be Luton — a small industrial town about two hours north of London.
When questioned, the demonstrators — some immigrants but some born in Britain — deny that any disloyalty to Queen and country is involved. For they do not regard themselves as “British Muslims” but merely as Muslims living in Britain. Their allegiance is to Islam, they say, not to an infidel government that is illegitimate and destined one day to be replaced by an Islamic regime based on traditional Sharia law.
Not all Muslims in Britain share these views, of course. One of the very few physical attacks on Muslims was carried out not by white bigots but by three moderate Muslims who felt that their fundamentalist victim was giving Islam a bad name. Also, many Muslim parents must be worried that their impressionable sons, led astray by some extremist Mullah, might set off for Kabul without any real idea of the horror that awaits them there. Still, the evidence suggests that a sizeable percentage of Britain’s two million Muslims cherishes separatist religious and ethnic sentiments. A Sunday Times survey of 1,170 Muslims showed 40 percent thought that Osama bin Laden was justified in waging war on the U.S., another 40 percent thought that Britons were justified in fighting with the Taliban, 68 percent thought it was more important to be Muslim than British, 73 percent thought that Tony Blair was not right to support the U.S., and a staggering 96 percent thought the U.S. should stop the bombing of Afghanistan.
It is possible to quibble with this survey. It was taken outside Mosques after prayers and so probably exaggerates the number of Muslims favorable to the Taliban. Also, almost all religious people would place their God above their country. A better-phrased question would have asked if Islam and Britishness were compatible — and many more than 14 percent would assuredly have answered yes.
Even with these qualifications, however, the survey suggests that some, maybe many, British Muslims live in a different mental world from their fellow citizens. They inhabit cultural enclaves that in significant ways are detached from the rest of British life. They resist cultural assimilation to the point, for instance, of removing their daughters from school in their early teens lest they be corrupted by a modern secular education. And they send their children to Pakistan to contract arranged marriages — not only because that will allow their new spouses to enter Britain legally but also to ensure that Muslim culture is transmitted to the next generation by minimizing the risk of mixed marriages.
We should not be surprised by this. After all, the preservation of immigrant cultures against the pressures and temptations of assimilation is one purpose of official multiculturalism in Britain, in the U.S. and in the nation which invented it, namely Canada. It simply never occurred to New Labor ministers, any more than to Bill Clinton, that the cultures being preserved by it might be even more hidebound and traditional, and less liberal, than their own national cultures which they saw as an obstacle to a “modernization” and ethnic equality.
Well, they understand it now. Britain’s Home Secretary, David Blunkett, has announced that the government will shortly introduce new programs to ensure that immigrants not only learn the English language but also master a list of the qualities that go to make up “Britishness.”
That is, of course, almost an American way of becoming British. Countless immigrants to the U.S. went to night school to learn how to become an American; the British until now have assumed that Britishness was something you simply picked up by living in the country long enough. And, indeed, older Muslims who came to Britain in the sixties and seventies generally assimilated to the traditional British identity comfortably enough and today express loyalty to their adopted country. So, both approaches have their merits.
But what Mr. Blunkett is likely to discover, when he sets out to draw up a list of qualities signifying “Britishness,” is that he is embarking on a magical mystery tour. Almost all the traditional elements in British political culture — the jury system, “fair play,” the Queen — have been laughed to scorn by New Labor. Newer symbols of “Cool Britannia” — the fashion industry, pop stars — evoke emotions very different to patriotism, ranging from envious adulation to a mystified irritation. And on top of that, the rich variety of institutions, values and loyalties enmeshed in a self-confident national culture have been replaced under multiculturalism by one official virtue, a tepid “tolerance” that respects all other groups and the values they embrace but grants no strong overriding attachment to one’s own people and its way of life.
Such a tolerance might well be worthy enough in the abstract. But it is inadequate and even harmful outside a specific cultural context (a deracinated tolerance would presumably permit genital female mutilation; a British or American tolerance would not.) And on its own it is quite incapable of evoking strong patriotic loyalties from anyone.
Not that multiculturalism wants to encourage such loyalties. Quite the reverse. It regards them as the cultural oppression of ethnic minorities. It encourages immigrants, their children and their grandchildren to cut themselves off from their fellow citizens and remain foreigners indefinitely. And if Britain’s Muslims are the test, it has had some success in that regard.
Under the impact of war, Tony Blair is discovering that multiculturalism is fundamentally incompatible with either patriotism or national unity. For some of its American admirers, of course, that’s the point.
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Like all of my fellow Jews as well as all decent Canadians, I was shocked by the brutal murder of David Rosenzweig. Like them also, I thoroughly detest hate crimes. Where we may part company, however, is that I oppose our national policy of punishing such crimes more harshly than others.
Let me first make it clear that I don’t oppose denouncing hate crimes as such, or tabulating them, solved and unsolved, as an index of the level of hatred in society. It’s important to call a spade a spade, with hate crimes as with terrorism, all the more so in view of the global upsurge of both. We mustn’t bury our heads in the sand pretending that it can’t happen here. It’s happening everywhere, and the Rosenzweig murder may well have been a case in point. At the same time, it remains important not to rush to see hate crimes where they’re not.
What I am questioning is the classification of a given offence as a hate crime for the purpose of dealing out a more severe penalty to the offender. A directive from our Department of Justice defines a hate crime as a “criminal offence committed against a person or property where there is evidence that the offence was motivated by bias, prejudice or hate, based on the victim’s race, national or ethnic origin, language, color, sex, age, mental or physical disability, sexual orientation or any other similar factors.” This description (although not the term “hate crime”) echoes Section 718.2.a.1 of the Criminal Code. You have to admire the authors of that paragraph: they’ve certainly covered all the bases. The question is whether this statute is really a good idea.
It’s only at the sentencing stage of a trial that the statute comes into play. Here the judge is instructed to consider mitigating or aggravating factors, and these have always included motive. Long before this article was on the books, prosecutors were free to suggest to a judge that the motive of hatred made a bad crime worse. The article, however, requires the judge to take this view and therefore to hand out a harsher sentence in the case of such a crime. True, this is not the only consideration he is instructed to treat as aggravating, but the others that are mandatory have in common that all are matters of circumstance or intent, not of motive. So this “hate crimes” statute presents an anomaly. In other cases the judge is permitted to treat a motive as aggravating, but only in this one is he required to do so.
Hatred is a bad motive, but is it any worse than those from which most murders are committed? Is murder any less “aggravated” when done for gain, for hire, from personal hatred or simply for the thrill of it? We must remember that in a free society hate is not itself a crime; the law doesn’t punish us for our mental states. Why then should actions proceeding from it be singled out for harsher punishment than similar actions proceeding from equally unsavory motives?
It’s said that society has a special interest in deterring hate crimes by expressing its special disapproval of them. In fact it has just as much interest in deterring crimes committed from the other motives I’ve listed (especially since these motives account for the vast majority of them). And while it may make us feel better to have pronounced hate crimes uniquely hateful, let’s not pretend that this will faze those who itch to commit one. They know already that society condemns their actions: that’s part of the attraction.
Under the present system it’s in the interest of prosecutors to cast an offence as a hate crime wherever possible, thus assuring harsher punishment for the offender. This may well seem unfair to him and provoke a backlash in his favour -- and against the group he victimized which has clamoured for the hate crime designation. At the very least, resort to the statute threatens to institutionalize alarmism.
It’s also worth recalling that we are men, not God, and that of all the elements of a crime, its motive may be the least transparent. Take even the Rosenzweig case. Maybe it was a hate crime, maybe not. What the killer did is clear enough but why he did it may remain opaque -- and not just to us. From what has been reported of him, he was an explosion waiting to happen. So young yet so rich in criminal convictions, a child without a family, a self-declared would-be cop killer, he was probably glad to hate just about anyone. Then consider his alleged mental state at the time of his atrocity. High on drugs, frustrated at his failure to obtain more of them, fresh from a humiliation at the hands of Jews in front of his girlfriend -- he had brandished his knife inside the kosher pizzeria but had succeeded only in cutting himself -- he may not have grasped the motive for his rage any more clearly than we do.
Lastly, you hear that exacting extra retribution for hate crimes helps us all reach something called closure. Quite frankly, I doubt this. But even if it does, closure is for doors. Penal systems should aim at justice. And justice is not served by a statute that singles out one bad motive from among all the others, thereby pressuring prosecutors to invoke it wherever even remotely plausible.
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Time magazine’s premier race-baiter, Jack White, is using the Trent Lott controversy as a means of attacking Republicans across the board as a racist party. And above all he can’t resist attacking Ronald Reagan.
In a Time magazine piece this week that is available online, White wrote:
Lott was among those who urged Reagan to deliver his first major campaign speech in Philadelphia, Mississippi, where three civil rights workers were murdered in one of the 1960s’ ugliest cases of racist violence. It was a ringing declaration of his support for “states’ rights” — a code word for resistance to black advances clearly understood by white Southern voters.
Here is what Reagan actually said:
What we have to do is bring back the recognition that the people of this country can solve its problems. I still believe the answer to any problem lies with the people. I believe in state’s rights and I believe in people doing as much as they can for themselves at the community level and at the private level. I believe we have distorted the balance of our government today by giving powers that were never intended to be given in the Constitution to that federal establishment. (Emphasis added.)
To be sure, it is difficult to imagine that Reagan was oblivious to the historical baggage of the phrase “states’ rights” in Mississippi, and it cannot be ruled out that he was conscious of the problematic implication of his choice of words, just as Jimmy Carter was not presumed innocent of his use of “ethnic purity” in 1976. But “states’ rights” was a sound principle of federalism that was debased by Democratic party rule in the south, for which it is not Republicans who owe an apology. Reagan had a long and well-known record of criticizing centralized government power, and this is how the media at the time interpreted his statement. “Most of those at the rally,” the New York Times reported, “apparently regarded the statement as having been made in that context.” And as a westerner Reagan had fully associated himself with the “Sagebrush Rebellion,” for whom “states’ rights” had no racial content, but rather meant wresting control of land from Washington. This was far from an outlandish or minority view. The same day Reagan made his “states’ rights” remark in Mississippi, the National Governors Association issued what the Associated Press described as “a militant call for reduced federal involvement in state and local affairs.” Arizona’s liberal Democratic Governor Bruce Babbitt wrote in a New York Times op-ed article that “It is time to take hard look at ‘states’ rights’ — and responsibilities — and to sort out the respective functions of the federal government and the states.” I missed where Jack White added Babbitt to his roster of racists (never mind Carter’s calculated appeal to “ethnic purity” in 1976).
To liberals, however, employing the phrase “states’ rights” in any context is to waive the bloody shirt of racism and segregation. Little time was wasted in accusing Reagan not simply of pandering to old-fashioned segregationist sentiment in the south, but of actively sympathizing with it. Patricia Harris, Carter’s secretary of Health and Human Services, told a steelworkers’ union conference in early August: “I will not attempt to explain why the KKK found the Republican candidate and the Republican platform compatible with the philosophy and guiding principles of that notorious organization.” (A KKK chapter in Louisiana had scored some cheap publicity by endorsing Reagan in 1980, which endorsement Reagan immediately and forcefully rejected.) But, Harris added, when Reagan speaks before black audiences many blacks “will see the specter of a white sheet behind him.” Andrew Young went even further, saying that Reagan’s remarks seemed “like a code word to me that it’s going to be all right to kill niggers when he’s President.” Coretta Scott King managed to top Young: “I am scared that if Ronald Reagan gets into office, we are going to see more of the Ku Klux Klan and a resurgence of the Nazi Party.” Maryland Congressman Parren Mitchell, a leader of the Congressional Black Caucus, said that “ Reagan represents a distinct danger to black Americans.” Reagan, it should be noted, received the endorsement of several black leaders in 1980, including the Rev. Ralph David Abernathy, Martin Luther King’s successor as head of the Southern Christian Leadership Council, and the Rev. Hosea Williams, another prominent cleric from the civil rights movement.
Even the bastions of media liberalism knew that attacking Reagan as a racist was wrong. The New Republic: “President Carter has made a grave moral error in trying to portray Ronald Reagan as a racist.” Carter’s statements “are frightful distortions, bordering on outright lies.” Washington Post reporter Richard Harwood wrote that “There is nothing in Reagan’s record to support the charge that he was ‘racist.’” The editorial page of the Post said that “This description [as a racist] doesn’t fit Mr. Reagan.”
The race-baiting attack on Reagan in 1980 backfired badly against Jimmy Carter, and contributed to Carter’s defeat. As in 1980, liberals may be about to overreach on the Lott affair in much the same way, so long as Republicans will follow Reagan’s example of standing on their principles.
— Steven Hayward is a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, and the author of The Age of Reagan, from which this article is adapted.
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Andrew Coyne
Reading David Ahenakew’s approving comments on the murder of six million Jews, one almost imagines he might have Tourette’s. They are so shocking, so revolting, that no ordinary anti-Semite could utter them.
Even the worst Holocaust-denier would not admit openly to the belief that the Jews deserved to be exterminated, but rather insists the idea is so monstrous that they must have made it up. Even the most paranoid Jewish-conspiracy crank does not advocate genocide as the answer. Even the Nazis generally felt obliged to conceal the policy under a blanket of euphemisms (“the Final Solution”) and evasions. Mr. Ahenakew is unique in explicitly endorsing both the Nazis’ reasoning and their methodology.
Which is to say that he is either totally unaware of how most of humanity views such things, or totally unconcerned. Neither speaks of a man in full possession of his reason. Yet this is not some backyard lunatic, but a man who has held the highest positions in native politics, and has received the country’s highest honours.
What then do we do with him? It is not possible merely to accept his apology. Indeed it’s not clear how he could apologize, try though he might: He said it and he plainly meant it, having thought about it for more than four decades, ever since he was a soldier stationed in Germany and was told that “the Second World War was created by the Jews.”
Certainly he was right to step down from his current posts, and certainly he should be stripped of his Order of Canada: The honour would otherwise be tainted by association. But criminal prosecution? The Saskatchewan government has asked the RCMP to investigate whether charges should be laid under the Criminal Code provisions against “hate propaganda.” There are three sections that might apply. Section 318 says that anyone who “advocates or promotes genocide” is guilty of an offence punishable by up to five years in prison. Section 319 (1) makes it an offence to make a public statement that “incites hatred against any identifiable group” that is “likely to lead to a breach of the peace.” Last, Section 319 (2) bans any statement “other than in private conversation” that “wilfully promotes hatred against any identifiable group.”
Whether he is guilty of any of these is for a court to decide. But it’s hard to see how he could escape being charged, at least under the last provision. After all, if James Keegstra could be prosecuted -- successfully, as it turned out -- for having denied the Holocaust took place, could any lesser treatment be meted out to Mr. Ahenakew for having justified the Holocaust, on the grounds that otherwise “the Jews would have owned the goddamned world”?
But to say that Mr. Ahenakew’s statements would seem to be against the law as it stands is not to agree that such a law should exist. Incitement, as in 319 (1), where there is a real likelihood of physical violence, is one thing. But there is no evidence that any Jew in Canada is in any greater danger today than before Mr. Ahenakew made his hateful statements. Or if there is, then every newspaper that published his remarks should likewise be charged: If words have such power to harm, it surely does not matter who says them, or why.
But “promoting hatred”? The moment the phrase is uttered, it trails off into the wind: The term is so vague, the consequences so uncertain. No one of any sense is the least bit likely to be persuaded by Mr. Ahenakew’s ravings. No one senseless enough to find him persuasive is the least bit likely to be put off by his prosecution. There is no risk of a Nazi revival in this country, and if there were, it would not be because we had insufficient penalties for hatred.
I am reminded of the character in Barbara Amiel’s memoirs, a Colonel Blimp type who recalls that he fought the war against Hitler “so that a gentleman could be an anti-Semite again.” There was a time in this country when gentlemen were anti-Semitic, when anti-Semitism was both a policy and a practice: at the best clubs, at some of our most prestigious universities, even at senior levels of government.
But anti-Semitism today is more the province of crackpots like Mr. Ahenakew. While the threat from fanatical Islamists is real, it is on the margins. And while their fellow travellers on the left, by their single-minded criticisms of Israel, may be guilty of outrageous moral selectivity, it is a mistake to call this anti-Semitism. They find fault with Israel, while ignoring the dictatorships that surround it, not because it is Jewish, but because it is part of the West. It is on our side, and as such it arouses their instinctive opposition, as any Western ally does.
Yet this has much in common with anti-Semitism, in appeal if not in content. It is a form of conspiracy theory, with all its illicit thrills -- the belief, not merely in unseen powers and official lies, but that one is uniquely immune to their deceptions. It is not paranoia, but self-flattery.
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How to become a diverse organization and keep your sanity.
Jane Hollingsworth had a problem. A staff worker with parachurch college ministry InterVarsity Christian Fellowship (IVCF), she needed to find a facility to host her student conference. But given the cultural climate of America in the 1940s, her group of white and black students was rebuffed again and again.
When even key IVCF supporters questioned her decision to include black students, the organization’s board took a radical stance. In June 1948, it resolved not to hold any events at a facility discriminating against people of color. The resolution went on to say: “Since colored people tend to relate segregation and the Christianity which we represent, we must demonstrate that in Christ there is neither black nor white.”
Although Christian organizations have made progress in the area of race relations since the 1940s, they continue to wrestle with the challenge of demonstrating that Christianity is not merely a segregated domain. Promise Keepers’ emphasis on racial reconciliation is perhaps the most public expression of this desire. But on a day-to-day level, Christian leaders are often unsure of how exactly to make the dream of racial diversity a reality.
IVCF, however, is one organization that has actively pursued multiethnicity, both internally and through its ministry. Thirty years ago, 4 percent of its staff and students were ethnic minorities. Today those percentages have grown to 16 percent (for staff) and 35 percent (for students), which compares favorably with the national average of 27 percent of all college students who identify themselves as ethnic minorities. The diversity was reflected in the dizzying multicultural representation of participants at its triennial Urbana Student Mission Convention on December 26–29, 2003.
Christianity Today convened key leaders in IVCF to talk with editor David Neff about how the organization became so multiethnic. Each participant personally knows the struggles and triumphs the organization has experienced in achieving this goal. Between them, they have nearly 90 years of campus ministry experience in IVCF: Phil Bowling–Dyer, national director of black campus ministries; Orlando Crespo, national director of Latino Fellowship; Jim Lundgren, director of collegiate ministries and vice president; and Jeanette Yep, vice president and director of multiethnic ministries.
What does it mean for an organization to be committed to multiethnicity?
Jim Lundgren: Here is the secret that took us decades to learn: we realized that this is really about changing ourselves as an organization, not about just having the right makeup of people present. My hope is that other organizations will move a little more quickly than ours did by recognizing from the beginning that the presence of minorities is only a small piece of the puzzle.
True multiethnicity is going to change your worship style. It’s going to change how you make decisions and who makes decisions. Those from other cultures bring a different perspective about the way decisions are made. Some groups are more authoritative, other cultures are much more process-oriented. You’re going to have to work out those differences.
Jeanette Yep: To really work, multiethnicity must be a value-driven commitment. We’ve made slow and steady progress, albeit with many steps backwards, because of our value-driven commitment to reach the campus in all its ethnic diversity. You must also be prepared for a long process, composed of small steps requiring faithfulness along the way. I think that’s what wipes many people out.
Phil Bowling-Dyer: Organizations must first commit to regular prayer regarding multiethnicity. Multiethnicity is not just a trendy policy; it is the manifestation of a scriptural value that is countercultural. Those who commit to multiethnicity will be dealing with issues on different physical and spiritual levels, and they will need the power of the resurrected Jesus to bring things together.
What were the key, perhaps even controversial, steps you took that made multiethnicity a reality?
Yep: In the early ‘80s, I chaired a task force that proposed several organizational changes. One was to change our purpose statement, to be explicit about our desire to reach students of every ethnicity as we evangelized the campus. Second, we asked for a vice president of multiethnicity, who would report to the president and ride point on this issue. And then we asked for money. We asked for a portion of every dollar raised in InterVarsity by staff workers, which we called a “tithe,” to be designated specifically to support multiethnic staff, because we knew funding was such a large barrier for them.
Our proposal was so fundamentally new for any Christian organization, and certainly new for InterVarsity, that we thought it would be rejected outright. But president Gordon MacDonald approved our proposal. And we just couldn’t believe it.
Lundgren: Money is always a lightning rod, but the urban regional directors of IVCF told Gordon, “We’ve got to have it. This is really crucial.” Some staff resisted, saying, “I’m not receiving my full salary, I haven’t even been able to raise my whole support.” Others questioned whether this was just a “politically correct” move on InterVarsity’s part. And so we repeatedly asked, “Is this a biblical value? Or are we buying into the campus cultural pluralism?” For some people, it’s taken several years of talking through those issues before they’ve come on board.
But the majority was very supportive. In many parts of the country, staff went even further and taxed themselves again. For example, here in Chicago, in addition to their 1 percent “tithe,” staff members voted as a team to give another $500 a year per person out of their own support.
Orlando Crespo: It is critical for organizations to not only say they are committed to multiethnicity, but to demonstrate that commitment through structural changes. Even if it’s just small baby steps, at some point an organization needs to make these changes, and even small changes can help to bring bigger changes later. So for us to have a vice president of multiethnicity starting in the 1980s, that step slowly brought on other significant changes later on.
What is the relationship between pursuing multiethnicity and pursuing racial reconciliation?
Lundgren: You can’t do multiethnicity unless you have a high value for reconciliation. You have to be willing as an organization to go back in your history and deal with areas where people have been hurt by the organization or by other people in the organization—white people on white people, black on black, whatever the case may be, and not just cross-ethnically but also within ethnic groups.
It’s so easy for an organization to say, “Let’s forget about the past and only look to the future, this stuff happened long ago and it doesn’t affect us now.” But it does affect you. And you either have a value as an organization to go back and work out hard relationships or you don’t, and if you don’t, you won’t move forward in racial reconciliation.
Yep: I once apologized to a Vietnamese student, although both of us were living here in this country, for the ethnic Chinese people’s exploitation of the Vietnamese in the mid-1970s. Although I wasn’t in Vietnam at the time of the atrocities, as a Chinese American, I’m part of the larger Chinese family and need to accept those collective sins as my own. This story was repeated by a speaker at the 1993 Urbana Missions Convention, and afterward, at a gathering of international students, the Japanese students bowed before the Korean student delegation and publicly asked forgiveness for wrongs done against Korea when it was colonized by Japan.
Though there will always be moments of hurt between and among people, by taking this path an organization will discover that the reconciling work of Christ can find full expression and open the door for true progress.
Crespo: Reconciliation can only be done with the help of ethnic minorities. They can expose the subtle or not so subtle racism within an organization. And they must be in the middle of the destructuring and restructuring of any organization moving toward greater multiethnicity. They cannot just serve as consultants who make recommendations from the margins for those who have the real power to bring change to the organization, who are typically white.
Bowling-Dyer: There will also be whites within an organization who understand the issues and whose input will be helpful, but organizations must make sure they hear the people of color first. This is one of the first signs that an organization is truly moving toward multiethnicity—they listen to the voices of those not like themselves.
Many organizations start on this path and then give up. Why?
Lundgren: One thing that keeps predominantly white Christian organizations from continuing in this process is that when they start succeeding they take a lot of flak. For a two- or three-year period it’s really intense.
It comes from all sides. The people who loved what you were say, “Why are you changing? Why is what we loved and the reason we joined this organization disappearing?” Then when the people of other ethnicities start feeling at home in the organization, they start being honest with you about what’s really hard about being with you. And so the person who is trying to lead this process says, “I’ve made everybody who used to love us hate us, and the people I’ve worked hard to bring in aren’t saying ‘thank you’; they’re telling me everything we’re doing wrong.”
But if you persevere, listen to both sides, bring them together and keep them talking, there is a certain strength that comes from hanging with it. Eventually people say, “Okay, the leader is really serious about this. I’ll trust him or her.” It’s not that all the criticism goes away, but it gets to a point where you can start having some successes and everybody can celebrate.
Bowling-Dyer: Pursuing multiethnicity requires that organizations truly risk. But they should do so and not be afraid of failure, because it is through failure, through confronting racist tendencies and prejudice then pushing and working through them, that they will come out on the other side.
How do you know you’ve reached the end of the journey?
Crespo: To become a truly diverse community is a life-long process. The moment we think we have arrived is the moment we start moving backward and away from diversity. The very fabric of our diverse country means that someone, somewhere is being excluded at any given time. There are always newcomers we must embrace.
Yep: Being multiethnic is more meaningful than just being bicultural. It is also more difficult. It involves interacting with people of many different cultures. There are many expressions of Latino/Hispanic, Black/African American, and Asian American cultures, as well as many variations of white/European culture. You may be able to understand and embrace one culture that’s different from your own. But embracing multiethnicity, although it is much harder, is also more reflective of the Kingdom.
Bowling-Dyer: It is a long-term discipleship process because it is not just about a change of values and policies; or just about a change of people’s hearts and actions; or just about a change of the perceptions of others outside the organization. It requires changing all of these parts. Those who choose this way should be prepared for a long and arduous journey filled with arguments, misunderstandings, and painful change. The fruit of such a journey, however, can be truly incarnational evangelism that reaches new communities, broader biblical insights that propel an organization forward, and more diverse and better-equipped Christian leadership on all levels.
==============================
[liberal viewpoint]
http://www.globalissues.org/HumanRights/Racism.asp.
Racism is a very touchy subject for some, as issues concerning free speech and Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights come into play. Some people argue that it is just words. Others point out that these words can lead to some very dire and serious consequences (World War II being an example.)
Racism in Europe
Europe is often one of the first places people think of when racism is discussed. From the institutionalized racism, especially in colonial times, when racial beliefs -- even eugenics -- were not considered something wrong, to recent times where the effects of neo-Nazism is still felt. Europe is a complex area with many cultures in a relatively small area of land that has seen many conflicts throughout history. (Note that most of these conflicts have had trade and resource access at their core, but national identities have often added fuel to some of these conflicts.)
In “the century of total war”, and the new millenium, Europe is seeing an alarming resurgence in xenophobia and racial hatred.
A short review from the Inter Press Service highlights the rise of neo-Nazism in 2000 in Europe and suggests that “far from being a fringe activity, racism, violence and neo-nationalism have become normal in some communities. The problems need to tackled much earlier, in schools and with social programmes.”
Ethnic minorities and different cultures in one country can often be used as a scapegoat for the majority during times of economic crisis. That is one reason why Nazism became so popular.
In France, May 2002, the success of far right politician Le Pen in the run for leadership (though he lost out in the end) sent a huge shockwave throughout Europe, about how easy it was for far right parties to come close to getting power if there is complacency in the democratic processes and if participation is reduced.
In various places throughout Western Europe, in 2002, as Amnesty International highlights, there has been a rise in racist attacks and sentiments against both Arabs and Jews, in light of the increasing hostilities in the Middle East.
Earlier in 1998, in an area of Germany a right wing racist party won an unprecedented number of votes.
In Austria, the Freedom Party was able to secure the majority of the cabinet posts. The party is an extreme far right party, whose leader, Jörg Heider, has been accused of sympathetic statements towards the Nazis. The European Union has reacted to this indicating that Austria’s participation may be in jeopardy. This Guardian Special Report has much more in-depth coverage.
In Italy, there are attempts to try and deal with the rise in undocumented immigrants from Tunisia. The reactions from the right wing have been labeled by some as being “openly racist”.
UK, for example, has one of the highest rates of racial violence in Western Europe, and it is getting worse. In London, April 1999 saw two bombs explode in predominantly ethnic minority areas, in the space of one week, where a Nazi group has claimed responsibility. The summer of 2001 has seen many race-related riots in various parts of northern England.
Spain has seen increased racial violence lately. The growing economy invites immigrants from North African countries such as Morocco. However, the poor conditions that immigrants have had to endure and the already racially charged region has led to friction and confrontations.
Racism in Australia
“In 1987, a sensational “discovery” was made by a Sydney University team, led by Australia’s most celebrated pre-historian, Professor D J Mulvaney. They reported that the Australian population in 1788 was 750,000, or three times the previous estimate. They concluded that more than 600,000 people had died as result of white settlement.” -- John Pilger.
In June 1998, One Nation, an Australian nationalist party in Queensland won 25 percent of the votes with their main lines at fighting immigration by non-whites. This has been possible where unemployment has been high and where it is easy to convince the people that immigrants are taking their jobs as it provides a convenient excuse. In a speech the party leader said that Australia was “in danger of being swamped” by Asians and she also questioned the special welfare benefits for Australia’s Aborigines. The good news regarding this is that in the latest rounds of State elections, the same party, just two months later won only 6 percent of the votes.
Australia has also had a very racist past in which apartheid has been practiced and where indigenous Aboriginal people have lost almost all their land and suffered many prejudices. In the past, the notorious policy that led to the “Lost Generation” was practices. This was the institutionalizes attempt to breed out the Aboriginal people. (This also ocurred in various parts of the Americas too.)
Aborigines are the poorest group in Australia and suffer from very much preventable diseases. For more about these issues, you can start at these harrowing reports from John Pilger a prominent Australian journalist who has been critical of many western policies.
The Sydney 2000 Olympics also brought some of Australia’s racist past and present to the fore. (On the positive side, many parts of Australia’s rich diversity in people is slowly helping relieve prejudism. However, some more traditional and conservative politicians are still openly racist.)
Racism in Africa
A number of nations in Africa are at war or civil war, or have been very recently, just few years after they have gained their independence from former colonial countries.
While most of the conflicts have resources at their core, and involve a number of non-African nations and corporations, additional fuel is added to the conflict by stirring up ethnic differences and enticing hatred. (Also not that the artificial boundaries imposed in Africa by European colonialism and imperialism during the divide and rule policies has further exacerbated this situation and plays an enormous role in the root causes of these conflicts compared to what mainstream media presents.)
In Zimbabwe, there has been increasing racism against the white farmers, due to poverty and lack of land ownership by Africans.
South Africa until recently suffered from Apartheid, which legally segragated the African population from the Europeans.
Racism in the Middle East
For a long time there has been resentment by many in the Middle East at the policies of the American and other governments in their region. For many of the more extremist factions, this has turned into a form of racism as well, where many things that are western are hated or despised.
The situation of Palestine and Israel is also very contentious. Extreme views on both sides by perhaps a minority, but perhaps an influential and often violent minority, results in racism on both sides.
With the terrible acts of terrorism committed by terrorists in America, on September 11, 2001, there has additionally been an outpouring of violent racial hatred by a minority of people in Western countries against people that look Middle Eastern (some who are not Middle Eastern, such as Indians, have even been beaten or killed). Furthermore, with the American-led attacks in Afghanistan in retaliation for those terrorist attacks, from Egypt to Pakistan, there have been minorities of people who have protested violently in the streets, and also committed racist acts, attacking anything that appears Western, from Western citizens, to even UNICEF and other UN buildings.
Yet, this is more complex than just a clash of religions and race, as deeper an issue is the geopolitical and economic activities of the past decades and centuries that have fueled these social tensions. The Middle East is definitely a very sensitive issue politically. See this web site’s section on the Middle East for more on that.
Racism in Asia
In Cambodia, there has been a strong anti-Vietnamese sentiment.
In Indonesia there has been a lot of violence against the affluent Chinese population who have been blamed for economic problems that have plagued the country in recent years.
Kurds in Iraq, Turkey, and Iran
Tamils in Sri Lanka
Racism in North America
A report about the plight of the Innu people in Canada also reveals how racism can be a factor. In the words of the authors, the “report reveals how racist government policies, under the guise of benevolent ‘progress’, have crippled the Innu of eastern Canada -- a once self-sufficient and independent people.” (Click here to check out the report. While this report is about the problem of an indigenous people in Canada, it is a common story throughout history for many peoples and cultures.)
In the US, racism is a well known issue. From racial profiling to other issues such as affirmative action, police brutality against minorities and the history of slavery and the rising resentment against immigrants.
Since the horrific terrorist attacks on the United States on September 11, 2001, Security concerns have understandbly increased, but so too has racial profiling, discrimination etc. In the early aftermath of the attacks some Americans that were understandably outraged and horrified, even attacked some members of the Sikh community where at least one was even killed, because they resembled certain types of Muslims, with beards and turbans. Various people of Middle East or South Asian origin have faced controversial detensions or questionings by officials at American airports. This web site’s section on the war against terror has more details on these aspects.
The Lure of Adolph Hitler and neo-Nazism
It seems that many people who join supremacist groups do so at a young age, and a lot of recruiting by these various hate groups are targeted at children. This report from a reformed skinhead mentions how easy it can be for some people, especially children, to be recruited into these groups.
On the anniversary of Adolph Hitler’s birthday in April 1999, a planned killing spree in an American school by two children claimed the lives of many fellow school mates. It is reported that they were targeting ethnic minorities and were involved in some Nazi related activities.
The anger and conflict in Kosovo was being resolved with weapons, while many early warning signs, which had been recognized by many groups for a number of years, were not heeded.
In USA, the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995 (incidentally, the day before the birthday of Adolph Hitler) triggered anti-Muslim sentiments, even though it was not an Islamic group at all. The previous link reports that there was a 60% increase in discrimination of Muslims in the USA.
And during the week of Adolf Hitler’s birthday, also in 1999, neo-Nazi groups were suspected of planting two nail bombs that exploded in predominantly ethnic minority areas of London. The following week, a gay bar in London’s Soho area was also bombed killing at least 3 people. The fact that the Stephen Lawrence case, which, in UK is one of the perhaps most infamous on-going cases of racism in the police force and has received much attention at the time of this bombing could be more than coincidence.
Racism against Gypsies
One group of people that often go unnoticed when it comes to racism and discrimination are Gypsies. In Europe they have been persecuted to a similar extent as the Jews throughout history, including World War II and even now they are largely mistreated or ignored.
Immigration
As the world globalizes in terms of nations’ economies, trade and investment, borders are opened up more easily for “freer” flow of goods and products. However, people still are not able to move as freely. In some places around the world, there are additional restrictions being put up on people’s movements.
United States
Human Rights Watch in USA report on how the US Immigration and Naturalization Service treat immigration detainees as though they were criminals by putting these otherwise innocent people in jail, indefinitely.
(US immigration policies are interesting in that they are really mainly designed to bring in immigrants with a certain level and type of education to help enhance the nation, economically. This means a disproportionate representation of that population becomes part of the American culture and hence it even affects the streotypical image of such minorities as always being hard-working and only interested in the pursuit of financial gains, etc. It is even used by some politicians as an excuse to show how other immigrant populations in the US who have been around longer should follow newer immigrant’ examples, even using that as a basis to argue for a further cut in social welfare subsidies etc., unfairly blaming such people solely for their economic problems. So, as an unfortunate example, South Asian Americans are inadvertently looked upon negatively by many in the Black and Latino communities, and vica versa.)
United Kingdom
In UK, some plans had been unveiled to improve the immigration process. Some groups, however, have expressed concerns about it. For example they fear that this plan will allow immigration officers more power than before to detain and increase the number of asylum seekers whose appeals have been refused. Also, one idea was to place more checks by liaison officers at the ports and airports of the countries that the asylum seekers are leaving. This, some people believe, would prevent genuine asylum seekers being able to flee their country where human rights violations may be taking place. Even though the number of people seeking asylum in UK is not as large as some other countries in Europe, UK’s current process means that the prison-like asylum centers house people who may be waiting up to seven years before their case can be heard.
United Europe
The European Union has had policies to control immigration from non-member countries. Spain for example seems to be facing a larger number of immigrants from Morocco and other North African countries where people want to escape their politically conflict-torn countries and seek a better standard of living in Europe. However, many people are dying trying to achieve this. Some human rights activists say that the European restrictions need to be modified or African nations need to overcome their underdevelopment in order to alleviate this. However the world “free” trade model doesn’t look like it will immediately help the developing nations.
The Internet and Racism
And while the World Wide Web is a great proponent for the ideals of free speech, it can also be a breeding ground harboring hatred. This is very serious as the number of hate sites that have sprung up in the recent years is shocking and also increasing at an alarming rate.
Lately there has been much talk of Internet sites hosting hate material. Some groups such as HateWatch have gone as far as buying racist domain names so that real racists cannot buy these domains themselves!
For more about the Internet and free speech, check out this site’s section on human rights and the Internet. It has some useful links to additional sites and material.
Globalization and Racism
As globalization in its current form expands, so too does the inequality that accompanies it, as discussed throughout the trade related section on this web site. Rising inequality can result in an increase in racial bias for scapegoating or advancing xenophobic and isolationist tendencies.
Additionally, just as during say, French and British Imperial days racial bias was ingrained within the culture itself (as explored in great detail by Edward Said, for example, in his books such as Orientalism (Vintage Books, 1979) and Culture & Imperialism (Vintage Books, 1993)), so too are elements of this seen in today’s period of globalization, with what A. Sivanandan describes as the increasing “xenophobic culture of globalisation” seen in some parts of the world:
“Racism has always been both an instrument of discrimination and a tool of exploitation. But it manifests itself as a cultural phenomenon, susceptible to cultural solutions, such as multicultural education and the promotion of ethnic identities.
Tackling the problem of cultural inequality, however, does not by itself redress the problem of economic inequality. Racism is conditioned by economic imperatives, but negotiated through culture: religion, literature, art, science and the media.
... Once, they demonised the blacks to justify slavery. Then they demonised the “coloureds” to justify colonialism. Today, they demonise asylum seekers to justify the ways of globalism. And, in the age of the media, of spin, demonisation sets out the parameters of popular culture within which such exclusion finds its own rationale - usually under the guise of xenophobia, the fear of strangers.”
-- A. Sivanandan, Poverty is the new black, The Guardian, August 17, 2001
With expanding globalization, the demands for more skilled workers, especially in North America, Europe and elsewhere (while they cut back on education spending themselves, little by little), has led to increased efforts to attract foreign workers -- but filtered, based on skill. At the same time, this increases resentment by those in those nations who are not benefitting from globalization.
Additionally, those trying to escape authoritarian regimes etc are finding it harder and harder to get into these countries, due to tighter immigration policies. Hence it is harder to immigrate to the wealthier nations unless, says Liz Fekete, “these citizens are part of the chosen few: highly-skilled computer wizards, doctors and nurses trained at Third World expense and sought after by the West. Global migration management strategy saps the Third World and the former Soviet bloc of its economic lifeblood, by creaming off their most skilled and educated workforces.” From the perspective of globalization, Liz continues, “the skills pool, not the genes pool, is key.”
Immigrants face numerous criticisms and challenges; It is difficult enough often, to get into another nation as mentioned above. If one succeeds, then additional struggles (some to naturally be expected, of course) are faced:
* Living in a new country can be daunting, especially when the cultural differences are great.
* As a result it can be expected that an immigrant would try to maintain some semblance of their own culture in their new country of stay.
* Or, due to fears of racism or due to the culture shock it would be expected that immigrant communities would form as a way to deal with this and as a means to help each other through.
* By doing this, sometimes they face criticism of not integrating and of “sticking with their own kind”;
* Yet, on the other hand, if they do integrate in some way, they face critique from certain types of environmentalists and others of contributing to environmental degradation by increasing their consumption to the high levels typical of the host nation.
o (And if environmental degradation is the concern, then it would make sense that one of the main issues at hand to address would be the consumption itself and its roots, regardless of who is doing it -- in this context
o That is, if the host nation had different modes of consumptions, immigrants would likely follow those too.
o Hence, singling out immigrants for being a factor in environmental degradation is often unfair, and itself hints of prejudice and of attitudes -- intentional or not -- almost like “stay out; we want to maintain and not share our lifestyle and standards of living; we recognize it is wasteful but if not too many are doing it, then it is ok” etc.)
UN’s World Conference on Racism
A UN Global Conference to discuss racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance was held from 31st August to 7 September 2001.
While it was brave enough for the United Nations to attempt to hold such a meeting, it proved to be a heated challenge. While all nations are good at being critical of others (and often very accurately, although often not!), when it comes to one’s own criticisms, most would be uncomfortable to say the least. As an example:
* United States and Europe were against effective discussions of slavery reparations (and sent in only low-level delegates -- a possible sign on how they really feel about this conference, and what it is about)
* Israel and United States were against discussing the possibility that Zionism is racist against Palestinians, causing both to walk out of the conference altogether
* India was against including discussions about caste-based discrimination
* Some Arab nations were against discussions on oppression of Kurds or Arab slave trade
* etc.
A watered down declaration was eventually made.
Such an eventful week shows how far we all have to go! It is also a detailed issue, and the following links may provide more details:
* World Conference Against Racism is the official United Nations web site
* OneWorld.net Special Report on Racism provides a huge number of articles from all sorts of NGO and other partners.
More Information
For more information you could start off at the following:
* The Institute of Race Relations has a very informative site about racism in Europe and UK in particular.
* A report from VSO’s Orbit magazine looks at how poor and misrepresented press coverage of the developing world by the developed countries leads to stereotyping.
* OneWorld Resources:
o Guide Racism
o Guide Immigration
o Ethnicity and Conflict Think Tank. (Also check out their Ethnicity and Conflict links.)
* Confronting Racism in 1998 is a good article on the subject.
* World In Action’s look into Combat 18, a violent racist hate group in UK and Europe.
* A couple of interesting pieces from Noam Chomsky:
o Section 9 from a book, titled “The Prosperous Few and the Restless Many”
o Sections 3 and 4 of this book titled “Keeping the Rabble in Line”
* Fight Racism. This is a web site that concentrates on Racism with lots of information.
==============================
[liberal viewpoint]
Affirmative Action, Immigration & Welfare: Confronting Racism in 1998
by Paul Kivel
Oakland, California
[a liberal]
The following article is taken from a speech given at the University of Kansas in Lawrence, Kansas by Paul Kivel. The article is based on his book Uprooting Racism: How White People Can Work for Racial Justice.
I’d like you to imagine a pyramid
These are the times we live in -- a few of the things that are happening now which provide the context for our gathering here this evening.
We are experiencing large scale cutbacks in social services, tremendous corporate downsizing, exportation of jobs overseas, environmental dumping of toxic wastes, primarily in communities of color, decrease in the standard of living for most of us, hate crimes, including church burnings, physical assaults, and cross burnings, public policy attacks on communities of color, tremendous concentration of wealth and tremendous segregation in society along lines of class and race. Let’s look at this political context a little more closely to see what we’re up against.
I’d like you to imagine a pyramid and that pyramid will represent 100% of the population of the United States. At the very top of this pyramid imagine a tiny area, 1% of the pyramid representing 1% or 1/100th of the population. These people control 48% percent of the wealth of the richest country in the world. The net worth of each household in this group is over $3,000,000, and the annual income is over $400,000/year.
Now imagine a portion of the pyramid below this very topmost section which represents 19% of the population. This next 19% controls another 46% of the wealth of the country. The average net worth of each household is over $500,000, and the average household income is over $100,000. The total of the 1% and the 19% = 20% controls 94% of the wealth of the country.
Now if you imagine the rest of the pyramid -- 80% -- we get to divide up the leftovers, the remaining 6% of this country’s wealth. This leaves us with a net worth on average of $38,000 and an average income of $23,000. In fact there is a sizable segment of the population which would actually be below the pyramid entirely, with a negative net worth. This is one of the greatest concentrations of wealth that we know of among a ruling class at any time in the history of the world. Although anti-Semitic stereotypes would have us believe there are many Jews at the top of the pyramid, a careful look at the distribution of wealth, and at political and corporate leaders in this country would reveal few Jews. Those at the top are primarily white and primarily Christian.
In the midst of this economic and political environment, our ruling class is seizing the opportunity to consolidate and extend its power by trying to rollback the civil rights achievements of the last thirty years, and the social security programs of the last 60 years.
Because of the struggles of working men and women in the streets during the depression years, the government enacted a social contract which provided for basic, minimal support for those in need, particularly for women and children in need, men out of work, the homeless, the hungry. These were safety nets to catch those for whom the economic system was unable to provide jobs and security.
Later, because of the struggles of African Americans in the 1950s and ‘60s, and women, gays and lesbians, people with disabilities, and many other groups, we expanded our understanding of who should be included in basic civil rights protections, voting rights, and equal opportunity access to jobs, education and training.
During both periods we and our foreparents fought many bloody battles to achieve those social and political gains. On the other side, from the top of the pyramid, granting those gains became strategies by the political and economic elite to curtail further social rebellion and prevent even greater changes from being made in our society.
When Ronald Reagan came to power in 1980, he stated explicitly that his goal was the rollback of the gains of the civil rights era, and even the gains made during the 1930s. The attack on affirmative action is an example of the former, and the attack of welfare is an example of the latter.
These attacks have continued through today, virtually regardless of who was president and which party they represented. Those policies have had a devastating effect in lowering our standard of living, degrading the environment, exporting jobs, blaming people of color and women, and distorting the very language we use to talk about civil rights, equal opportunity and oppression. I am referring primarily to our domestic situation but I need to acknowledge the even more severe impact these policies have had on the lives of people in third world countries, not limited to but including our military invasions and support of war in Vietnam, Grenada, Panama, Somalia, East Timor, Nicaragua, and most recently Iraq, to name just a few.
During this time racism has flourished
During this time racism has flourished. The reasons are very simple. It has been politically expedient and it ties in with longstanding cultural and social traditions in our country of blaming people of color for our social and economic problems to keep our attention away from those who are getting richer and richer.
Racism works by keeping people of color the center of attention, and white, ruling class men the center of power.
I want to repeat this because it is very important. Racism works by keeping people of color the center of attention, and white, ruling class men the center of power.
I want to be very clear that this is true regardless of our leader’s political affiliation. With this kind of concentration of wealth and control by the ruling class we will get attacks on affirmative action, treaties like NAFTA and GATT, welfare bills like that just enacted, and wars and intrusions overseas from Democrats and Republicans alike.
This creates the climate in which hate crimes of all kinds thrive. This creates the climate in which predominately black churches are defaced and burned and abortion clinics are bombed. This creates the climate which allows the media to downplay and minimize the violence and claim that it has been over exaggerated and dramatized. This creates the climate in which we can get distracted by discussions of political correctness rather than having discussions about social justice.
This is the climate in which we must talk about racism, which I now want to do for a few minutes. What is racism? Racism is often described as a problem of prejudice. Prejudice is certainly one result of racism, and it fuels further acts of violence towards people of color. However my assumption is that racism is the institutionalization of social injustice based on skin color, other physical characteristics, and cultural and religious difference. White racism is the uneven and unfair distribution of power, privilege, land and material goods favoring white people. Although we can and should all become more tolerant and understanding of each other, only justice will eliminate racism.
To illustrate just how pervasive racism is, and to give you some concrete examples to work with I want to do a couple of exercises with you. In this first I will read some sentences and I’d like you just to sit back, relax and notice whatever images, pictures or ideas come to mind.
# First sentence: “He walked into the room and immediately noticed her.” (NA)
# Another sentence: “This new sitcom is about a middle-aged, middle-class couple and their three teenage children.” (C, J)
# “The average American drinks two cups of coffee a day.” (C)
# “Women today want to catch a man who is strong, but sensitive.” (NA)
# “She didn’t know if she would get into the college of her choice.” (NA)
# “My grandmother lived on a farm all her life.” (J)
# “I have a friend who has AIDS.” (NA, C)
# “He won a medal on the Special Olympics basketball team.” (C, J)
Are all these people white? What ideas or images come to mind when you heard these sentences? I will read some of these sentences again. this time imagine that the people referred to are Chinese Americans. (Reread the ones marked C).
Does that change the meanings?
Try making them Native American. (The sentences marked NA).
How does that change the meaning?
If you are not Jewish, what happens when you make them Jewish? The sentences marked (J).
In reality, we would have to specify they are Chinese American, Native American or Jewish because we would not automatically assume they were. This is an indication of how pervasive and deep rooted racism is--how it goes far beyond our personal attitudes or prejudices.
we have been led to believe that racism is a question of particular acts of discrimination or violence. Calling someone a name, denying someone a job, excluding someone from a neighborhood--that is racism. These certainly are acts of racism. But what about living in a white suburb where people of color are excluded or harassed? What about working in an organization where people of color are paid less, have more menial work or fewer opportunities for advancement? Racism affects each and every aspect of our lives, all the time, whether people of color are present or not.
People of color know this intimately. They know that where they live, work and walk, who they talk with and how, what they read, listen to or watch on TV, their past experiences and future possibilities are all influenced by racism.
So far, we have been talking about language and language is important because it affects the way we see the world. However for those of us who are white, we can understand how pervasive racism is without actually seeing how it affects our own lives and opportunities. Without making the connection to our own lives we cling to myths of equal opportunity, level playing fields, and the belief that hard work makes all the difference.
It is not that white Americans have not worked hard and built much. We have. But we did not start out from scratch. We went to segregated schools and universities built with public money. We received school loans, VA loans, housing and auto loans when people of color were excluded or heavily discriminated against. We received federal jobs, military jobs and contracts when only whites were allowed. We were accepted into apprenticeships, training programs and unions when access for people of color was restricted or nonexistent.
The misconception that we are all given equal opportunities
Much of the rhetoric against more active policies for racial justice stem from the misconception that we are all given equal opportunities and start from a level playing field. We often don’t even see the benefits we have received from racism. We claim that they are not there.
Think about your grandparents and parents and where they grew up and lived as adults. What work did they do? What are some of the benefits that have accrued to your family because they were white?
I want to do another exercise with those of you who are white here. I’d like to ask the people of color to just observe this exercise. This is called a standup exercise--I’m going to read a series of statements and I’d like you to standup if a statement applies to you. Stand up, notice any feelings you have about the statement, look around to see who is standing with you, and then I will ask you to sit down while I read another statement. I will read each statement twice, figure out for yourself whether it applies to you. I would like to do this exercise in silence so that we can each notice what feelings come up for us without being distracted by comments, jokes, or other sounds. I’d like all the white people to participate in the exercise, although you have the right to pass on particular statements if you don’t feel comfortable standing. If you are physically unable to stand please raise you hand for each question that applies to you.
1. My ancestors were legal immigrants to this country during a period when immigrants from Asia, South and Central America or Africa were restricted.
2. I live on land that formerly belonged to Native Americans.
3. My family received homesteading or land-staking claims from the federal government.
4. I or my family or relatives receive or received federal farm subsidies, farm rice supports, agricultural extension assistance or other federal benefits.
5. I lived or live in a neighborhood that people of color were discriminated from living in or where redlining discriminates against people of color getting housing or other loans.
6. I or my parents went to racially segregated schools.
7. I live in a school district or metropolitan area where more money is spent on the schools that white children go to than on those that children of color attend.
8. I live in or went to a school district where the textbooks and other classroom materials reflected my race as normal, heroes and builders of the United States, and there was little mention of the contributions of people of color to our society.
9. I attended a publicly funded university, or a heavily endowed private university or college, and/or received student loans.
10. My ancestors were immigrants who took jobs in railroads, streetcars, construction, shipbuilding, wagon and coach driving, house painting, tailoring, longshore work, brick laying, table waiting, working in the mills, furriering, dressmaking or any other trade or occupation where people of color were driven out or excluded.
11. I have received a job, job interview, job training or internship through personal connections of family or friends.
12. I worked or work in a job where people of color made less for doing comparable work, did more menial jobs or were hired last, or fired first.
13. I work in a job, career or profession or in an agency or organization in which there are few people of color.
14. My parents were able to vote in any election they wanted without worrying about poll taxes, literacy requirements or other forms of discrimination.
15. I have never had to worry that clearly labeled public facilities, such as swimming pools, restrooms, restaurants and nightspots were in fact not open to me because of my skin color.
16. I don’t need to think about race and racism everyday. I can choose when and where I want to respond to racism.
This exercise can make some of us feel guilty for the benefits we have gained from racism. But this is not a useful response. We need to remember that we did not create the circumstances in which we stood for any of those statements. We are not responsible for racism -- it existed long before us. It continues to persist and to be reinforced and therefore we are responsible for what we do about it. Recognizing our full participation in it is a valuable first step in deciding to work against it.
Again, the purpose of this checklist is not to discount what we, our families and foreparents have achieved. But we do need to question any assumptions we retain that everyone started out with equal opportunity.
You may be thinking at this point, If I’m doing so well how come I’m barely making it? Some of the benefits listed above are money in the bank for each and every one of us. Some of us have bigger bank accounts--much bigger. Remember the economic pyramid I talked about earlier.
In 1995, women generally made about 74 cents for every dollar that men made. People with disabilities, people with less formal education, and people who are lesbian, gay or bisexual are generally discriminated against in major ways. Benefits from racism are amplified or diminished by our relative privilege. All of us benefit in some ways from whiteness, but some of us have cornered the market on significant benefits from being white to the exclusion of the rest of us.
Racism has a profound negative effect upon our lives
We have now come to the point of awareness where white people get stuck. We become overwhelmed by our knowledge of the devastating inequality of racism. We may feel upset, confused, angry, sad, frustrated, guilty, hopeless, or helpless. We tend to take it very personally and to indulge in our feelings. This is not about whether you are racist or not, or whether all white people are racist or not. We are not conducting a moral inventory of ourselves, nor creating a moral standard to divide other white people from us.
To avoid being called racist we may claim that we don’t notice color and don’t treat people differently based on color. However, we all notice color in just about every situation we’re in. It’s not useful or honest for any of us to claim that we don’t.
The only way to treat people with dignity and justice is to recognize that racism has a profound negative effect upon our lives, and therefore noticing color helps to counteract that effect. Instead of being color neutral we need to notice much more acutely and insightfully exactly the difference that color makes in the way people are treated.
Just as it’s not useful to label ourselves racist or not, it is not useful to label each other. Because racism operates institutionally, to the benefit of all white people, we are connected to the acts of other white people.
Of course we’re not members of the Klan or other extremist groups. Of course we watch what we say and don’t make rude racial comments. But dissociating from white people who do is not the answer. We need to dissociate from their actions and challenge their beliefs. We can’t challenge them, or even speak to them if we have separated ourselves from them, creating some magical line with the racists on that side and ourselves over here. This division leads to an ineffective strategy of trying to pull as many people as possible over to our (non-racist and therefore superior) side. Other white people will listen to us better, and be more influenced by our actions when we identify with them.
Perhaps more importantly, the people who are more visibly saying or doing things that are racist are usually more scared, more confused and less powerful than we are. (Or, they are trying to increase their own power by manipulating racial fears.) Since racism leads to scapegoating people of color for social and personal problems, we are all susceptible to resorting to racial scapegoating in times of trouble and I will return to this dynamic shortly. Visible acts of racism are, at least in part, in indication of the lack of power that a white person or group of people have to camouflage their actions. More powerful and well off people can simply move to segregated neighborhoods, or make corporate decisions that are harder to see and analyze as contributing to racism. Since the racism of the wealthy is less visible to us, those of us who are middle class can inadvertently scapegoat poor and working class white people for being more overtly racist, just as most white people scapegoat people of color. Scapegoating is devastating to the white community in two primary ways.
People of color have long been portrayed as economic threats to white Americans. We have heard and perhaps used phrases like, “They will do anything.” “They work for less.” “They take away our jobs.” “They are a drain on our economic system, eating up benefits.”
In fact, people of color don’t make most of the economic decisions that affect our jobs and livelihoods. Closing factories and moving them to “cheaper” parts of the country or abroad, busting unions, blocking increases in the minimum wage, decreasing health care and other benefits--these are all intentional attempts by the wealthy, who are predominately white, to increase profits and personal gain. This results in real decreases in our standard of living. Keeping our attention on people of color, including recent immigrants diverts our attention from the people who have been getting richer while we have been getting poorer.
I should mention here that one way racism and anti-Semitism interconnect is that Jews are also portrayed as economic threats to white Christians. Working and middle class whites are led to believe they are squeezed between better off Jews who will exploit them, and worse off people of color who will rip them off.
The second way racism turns our attention away from real exploitation and danger is by creating myths about family violence and sexual assault. We are taught that men of color and men from other cultures are dangerous. We have stereotypes about rapists being dark i.e. black strangers in alleys, about Asian men being devious and dishonest, about Latinos being physically and sexually dangerous. Racism has produced myths about every group of non-white, non-mainstream men being dangerous to white women and children.
The reality is that approximately 80 percent of sexual violence is committed within the same racial group by heterosexual men who know their victim. Those of us who are white and our children are tremendously more likely to be beat up, sexually assaulted or abused by heterosexual white men than by anyone else.
Despite this reality, we continue to believe that we need to protect ourselves from men who are different. We justify public policies which disproportionately lock up men of color, primarily Latino and African American men, but these changes do not make it appreciably safe for us. Because we are led to believe that we need “our” men to protect us from men “out there,” we are slow to respond to the violence of men in our family and dating relationships.
In other words, racism makes us vulnerable to economic exploitation and violence from other white people. Current public policy issues, a couple of which I will talk about in a few minutes, are excellent examples of just how this dynamic works.
(I have been referring mostly to racism but we could be looking at sexism with the same lens. However, I think that it is important to take one issue and look at it in depth to better understand how the whole system works. Once we understand the systematic nature of these issues we can decide how to move past our stuck places to become allies to people of color.)
Allies in the struggle for social justice
Being allies in the struggle for social justice is one of the most important things we can do. There is no one correct way to be an ally. Each of us is different. We have different relationships to social organizations, political processes and economic structures. Being an ally is an ongoing strategic process in which we look at our personal and social resources, evaluate the environment and decide what needs to be done. In order to do this well we must listen to people of color so that we can support the actions they take, the risks they bear in defending their lives and challenging white male hegemony.
I want to suggest 6 general guidelines for being a strong effective ally before I conclude with a look at current public policy issues.
1. Assume racism is everywhere, everyday. We assume this because it’s true, and because one of the privileges of being white or male is not have to see or deal with racism all the time. Notice who speaks, what is said, how things are done and described. Notice who isn’t present. Notice code words for race and gender, and the implications of the policies, patterns and comments that are being expressed. You already notice the skin color of everyone you meet and interact with--now notice what difference it makes.
2. Notice who is the center of attention and who is the center of power. Who is making decisions and who is getting blamed or scapegoated.
3. Take a stand against injustice. It is the only healthy and moral human thing to do. Intervene in situations where racism is being passed on. It should also be clear that we can’t become strong allies if we are afraid to say the wrong thing, make a mistake, take a risk or upset anybody.
4. Don’t call names or be personally abusive. Attacking people doesn’t address the systemic nature of racial and sexual inequality.
5. Support the leadership of people of color.
6. Don’t do it alone.
You will not end oppression by yourself. We can do it if we work together. Build support, establish networks, work with already established groups.
Affirmative action and welfare
Let’s take a brief look at public policy issues to understand how to critically analyze how they are framed and to demystify the vocabulary that is being used to describe them. I want to look at two issues, affirmative action and welfare because they are good current examples of how racism and sexism operate.
Affirmative action does work. It has produced opportunities for jobs, education and training for tens of thousands of people of color, white women, and poor and working class white men. Although often not enforced strongly, affirmative action programs have broken down longstanding barriers based on persistent and ongoing discrimination that many in our society face. Affirmative action for white males is an old tradition in American society. Veteran preferences, Alumni preferences, homeowner preferences in the form of home mortgage deductions, student deferments during the Vietnam war, and hundreds of millions of dollars of subsidies for manufacturers, farmers, mining and logging companies, including a $300 billion bailout of the Savings and Loan industry are all forms of affirmative action for white men. I am not going to argue whether each of these is good or bad. But it is clear that affirmative action is only being challenged as we have extended it to people of color and white women. This kind of double standard is exactly how racism and sexism work.
At the same time, as corporate and political leaders have moved jobs overseas, cut back funding for education and destroyed our communities, the attackers of affirmative action are blaming people of color, recent immigrants and women for the lack of jobs, training opportunities and educational opportunities for all those who need them.
Similarly for welfare “reform”. We are directed to blame women on welfare making $4-5,000/year instead of corporate executives making $4-500,000/year. We can see, with Clinton’s signing of the welfare bill which the Republicans crafted that we have to go back to that economic pyramid to understand why they stand together on issues like this. We can also see clearly the mystification at work where the coded language of racism leads us to conclude that we are talking primarily about African American women when the majority of women on welfare are white, and the coded language of sexism leads us to blame women when 2/3 of welfare recipients are children.
We need to learn to critically analyze public policy issues like these to understand how race and gender are crafted to distract our attention from the source of our problems and shift blame to those who are not responsible. Some of the questions we need to ask are:
* How is the problem being defined? Who is defining it and who is not part of the discussion?
* Who is being blamed for the problem? What racial or sexual fears are being appealed to?
* What is the core issue?
* What is the historical context for this issue?
* What is being proposed for a solution? How would it affect people of color?
* What are other options?
How are people organizing to address this problem in a more progressive way? How are people organizing to resist any racial backlash this issue might represent?
How can I become involved
The final question we need to ask is, “How can I become involved in addressing this problem?”
I hope by now you understand how the issue is social justice, not our personal prejudices, and that if we are to make a difference we need to maintain an institutional focus.
One of the contexts for our coming together here tonight is the ongoing, dramatic events that highlight racial hatred. Uprisings in Los Angeles and Miami, church burnings of predominately black churches in the south and last week the firebombing of the offices of a Black newspaper in Mississippi, police brutality against people of color in LA, Philadelphia, and New York. There is often intense, but brief media attention on these events, brining them into our living rooms on the evening news, making it seem like these are problems elsewhere. There is some danger in that media coverage, although it does bring to our attention important events.
First of all, there have always been black churches burned in the south by white people. There is longstanding, daily violence against people of color trying to go about their business, police brutality is no new occurrence. It is not as if there has ever been a lull in the violence that white people direct at people of color for trying to gain full, equal rights in this country. Every year the lists of hate crimes against people of color (and against women and Jews and lesbians, gays and bisexuals) includes church burnings, cross burnings, physical attacks, harassment, arson, rape, and murder. Nor are these crimes limited to somewhere out there, which brings me to a second point.
Hate crimes, discrimination, harassment and violence occur regularly throughout our country and we can easily be lulled into thinking they are only a problem somewhere else. I grew up in the late 1950s hearing about the civil rights struggles in the South, and believing that that was where the problem was. It was only when my parents sold our house in a white community in Los Angeles to a Japanese family, and we experienced hate calls, threats and harassment, did I realize that racism is not limited to somewhere else. So, before we all rush off somewhere else to fight against racism we probably have some work to do in our own community.
Our focus should be at home for another reason. We are each most effective where we are already connected in our lives in our workplaces, schools, neighborhood, community organizations and families. For example, most of you are related to this university/college, to this campus, to this community. One place to begin is to evaluate or assess where racism is happening here. Who has power to make significant decisions on this campus? How is hiring done? Who is promoted/who isn’t. Is there sexual or racial harassment. What is the curriculum like? What is the composition of the faculty. Talk with other white people, reach out to people of color and make plans, devise strategy, take action. There is probably racial injustice on this campus and people of color can point it out very easily.
In any kind of action start where you are? Build alliances. Don’t do it alone. Work with others.
Think to yourself for a moment. Who are family and friends you could talk with about doing racial justice work? Who will you talk with first?
Who are co-workers or fellow students who might help you form a racial justice action/support network? Who will you talk with first?
Name one network, action committee or support group or task force that you are going to join.
I want to share some information about a group that I have been involved with in California. As many of you know, there was a proposition on the California ballot, prop. 209, which eliminated all affirmative action programs in the state. The proposition was labeled the California Civil Rights Initiative in a blatant attempt to co-opt the language of the Civil Rights movement and to confuse people. When this initiative was first proposed a group of white men were talking about the attacks on affirmative action and realized that they had all benefited themselves from such programs. They wanted to do something -- to reclaim this issue as a white issue, and counter the deceptive and divisive tactics of the conservatives. We named ourselves Angry White Guys for Affirmative Action and began speaking and organizing in white communities in the rural and suburban areas of Northern California where we were based. We quickly gained publicity on the issue, dispelled lies and provided information and inspiration for other white people who were also concerned about the issue. We also conducted a walk of hope from church to church to synagogue in the white suburbs of the San Francisco Bay area to speak directly to our white brothers and sisters.
This is just one example of how white people can challenge other white people, starting from where we are and the connections we already have.
Unlearn prejudice, broaden our understanding of racism and learn to recognize injustice
I want to conclude with a story. A few years ago my colleagues and I did some training in Ohio and then returned six months later for a follow-up session. To start the workshop we asked the participants to talk about how the previous workshop had affected them.
I sat listening to several people describe how the workshop had changed their understanding of racism, how it had affected their relationships with co-workers and how it had sensitized them to racial injustice in their community. I was pleased that our work had a positive impact, but was a little uneasy without knowing why. Finally a white man, Mark, began to speak.
He said, “That workshop has influenced me in more ways than I can say. But I think it made the biggest difference at work. This fall we needed to hire five new staff (he works at a large county social service agency) and I made sure that three of those five people were people of color because our staff has been mostly white until now.
“That’s it,” I said to myself, realizing what had been missing from the others’ accounts.
It is important for us to unlearn prejudice, broaden our understanding of racism and learn to recognize injustice when we see it. But unless we are actively involved in the fight against racism we haven’t taken it far enough. We must understand the complexities of how racism works without becoming paralyzed by our understanding. We must acknowledge the depth of our emotional response to racism without becoming paralyzed by our feelings. Mark understood that he needed to take his awareness and turn it into concrete action. He changed his workplace. You can have a similar impact.
This is an election year. I want to remind you to vote and keep the heat and pressure on our politicians. You can also join with the network of peace and justice activists in this area. There are campus based individuals and organizations addressing issues of racial justice.
There is a long and glorious history of white people working as allies of people of color for liberation. You can join and strengthen the efforts of vast numbers of people who have always fought for social justice.
I want to leave you with a quote from my own Jewish tradition. It is from the fifth century Rabbi Tarfon and it goes:
It is not upon you to finish the work.
Neither are you free to desist from it.
http://www.inmotionmagazine.com/pkivel2.html
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In 1971, Canada was the first country in the world to adopt multiculturalism as an official policy. By so doing, Canada affirmed the value and dignity of all Canadian citizens regardless of their racial or ethnic origins, their language, or their religious affiliation. The 1971 Multiculturalism Policy of Canada also confirmed the rights of Aboriginal peoples and the status of Canada’s two official languages.
Canadian multiculturalism is fundamental to our belief that all citizens are equal. Multiculturalism ensures that all citizens can keep their identities, can take pride in their ancestry and have a sense of belonging. Acceptance gives Canadians a feeling of security and self-confidence, making them more open to, and accepting of, diverse cultures. The Canadian experience has shown that multiculturalism encourages racial and ethnic harmony and cross-cultural understanding, and discourages ghettoization, hatred, discrimination and violence.
Mutual respect helps develop common attitudes. New Canadians, no less than other Canadians, respect the political and legal process, and want to address issues by legal and constitutional means.
Through multiculturalism, Canada recognizes the potential of all Canadians, encouraging them to integrate into their society and take an active part in its social, cultural, economic and political affairs.
All Canadians are guaranteed equality before the law and equality of opportunity regardless of their origins. Canada’s laws and policies recognize Canada’s diversity by race, cultural heritage, ethnicity, religion, ancestry and place of origin and guarantee to all men and women complete freedom of conscience, of thought, belief, opinion expression, association and peaceful assembly. All of these rights, our freedom and our dignity, are guaranteed through our Canadian citizenship, our Canadian Constitution, and our Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
Multiculturalism has led to higher rates of naturalization than ever before. With no pressure to assimilate and give up their culture, immigrants freely choose their new citizenship because they want to be Canadians. As Canadians, they share the basic values of democracy with all other Canadians who came before them. At the same time, Canadians are free to choose for themselves, without penalty, whether they want to identify with their specific group or not. Their individual rights are fully protected and they need not fear group pressures.
Our diversity is a national asset. Recent advances in technology have made international communications more important than ever. Canadians who speak many languages and understand many cultures make it easier for Canada to participate globally in areas of education, trade and diplomacy.
Multiculturalism is a relationship between Canada and the Canadian people. Our citizenship gives us equal rights and equal responsibilities. By taking an active part in our civic affairs, we affirm these rights and strengthen Canada’s democracy, ensuring that a multicultural, integrated and inclusive citizenship will be every Canadian’s inheritance.
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Introduction
Respecting our Differences
Canada’s experience with diversity distinguishes it from most other countries. Our 30 million inhabitants reflect a cultural, ethnic and linguistic makeup found nowhere else on earth. Approximately 200,000 immigrants a year from all parts of the globe continue to choose Canada, drawn by its quality of life and its reputation as an open, peaceful and caring society that welcomes newcomers and values diversity.
Diversity has been a fundamental characteristic of Canada since its beginnings. At the time of European settlement there were more than 56 Aboriginal nations speaking more than 30 languages. As the French and then the English colonized Canada, treaties were signed that acknowledged Aboriginal nationhood. Linguistic duality was enshrined in law at the earliest stages of the development of the Canadian federation. At a time when it was accepted practice to establish sovereignty through war and cultural domination, there were enough Canadians who believed in the virtues of accommodation and mutual respect to ensure that, with some exceptions, Canada would develop peaceably and the foundations of its diversity would be preserved.
This does not mean that there aren’t tensions in Canada that flow from the differences between people. But as these tensions are addressed, Canadians learn to adapt and relate to one another despite their differences. Through practice, we have come to understand that the differences between us do not have to divide us. This encourages citizens who face common challenges to step forward and claim their right to full participation in Canadian society. As a consequence, Canada’s concept of what constitutes diversity is expanding. Diversity is moving beyond language, ethnicity, race and religion, to include cross-cutting characteristics such as gender, sexual orientation, and range of ability and age. The same approaches that have helped Canadians develop into a bilingual, multicultural society are now also helping to bring down other barriers that prevent individuals from reaching their full potential.
A broad framework of laws and policies supports Canada’s approach to diversity. At the federal level, these include the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, the Canadian Human Rights Act, the Employment Equity Act, the Official Languages Act, the Pay Equity Act and the Multiculturalism Act. Provinces and territories also have laws, human rights commissions and programs that promote diversity. Finally, Canada reinforces its commitment to diversity as a signatory to international conventions including, for example, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.
However, making equality of opportunity meaningful in a diverse society requires more than constitutional measures and legislation. All levels of government in Canada deliver programs that mobilize communities to promote dialogue and help people overcome barriers to their participation in society.
“Canada has become a post-national, multicultural society. It contains the globe within its borders, and Canadians have learned that their two international languages and their diversity are a comparative advantage and a source of continuing creativity and innovation. Canadians are, by virtue of history and necessity, open to the world.” -the Right Honourable Jean Chretien, Prime Minister of Canada, June 2000
Canada’s future depends on maintaining and strengthening its capacity to bring together peoples with many differences--even grievances--and building a peaceful society where no one’s identity or cultural heritage should have to be compromised. Canada’s approach to diversity is based on the belief that the common good is best served when everyone is accepted and respected for who they are, and that this ultimately makes for a resilient, more harmonious and more creative society. This faith in the value of diversity recognizes that respect for cultural distinctiveness is intrinsic to an individual’s sense of self worth and identity, and a society that accommodates everyone equally is a society that encourages achievement, participation, attachment to country and a sense of belonging.
“It is my deepest hope that Canada will match its new legal maturity with that degree of political maturity which will allow us to make a total commitment to the Canadian ideal. I speak of a Canada where men and women of Aboriginal ancestry, of French and British heritage, of the diverse cultures of the world, demonstrate the will to share this land in peace, in justice, and with mutual respect.”-the Right Honourable Pierre Elliott Trudeau, Prime Minister of Canada, April 17, 1982
Canada’s Approach
The Origin
The longest-standing test of Canada’s capacity to balance unity and diversity is the challenge of linguistic duality. We live in an officially bilingual country. Bilingualism is at the very core of our approach to diversity. It has been a defining characteristic of Canadian society from the very beginning of our constitutional development.
With Confederation in 1867, English and French were accorded official, constitutional status and a large range of powers was assigned to the constituent member provinces. Within one province, Quebec, French-speaking Canadians formed a large majority and were able to use these powers to protect and develop their culture. Elsewhere in Canada, the French language gradually came under strain with an influx of immigrants who were either of English origin or were encouraged to speak English.
It was not until the Official Languages Act of 1969 that a concerted effort was undertaken to restore the balance and address infringements of official language minority rights. This Act requires the Government of Canada to give equal status, rights and privileges to both languages in all federal institutions and requires federal institutions to serve Canadians in their official language of choice. Subsequently, with Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms in 1982, Canadian parents who are members of the English or French linguistic minority in the province in which they reside were granted the constitutional right to have their children educated in that language, where numbers warrant.
Beyond constitutional and legislative measures, the Government of Canada also works with provincial and territorial governments, community groups, professional associations and volunteer organizations to encourage the provision of services in both official languages. This support includes programs to help expand access to high-quality public education in the minority official language and to offer all Canadians students the opportunity to learn their second official language in school. Partly as a result of these programs, a total of five million Canadians are now proficient in both French and English.
“It is a strength and not a weakness that we are a permanently incomplete experiment built on a triangular foundation - aboriginal, francophone and anglophone. What we continue to create today, began 450 years ago as a political project, when the French first met with the Aboriginal people. It is an old experiment, complex and, in worldly terms, largely successful. Stumbling through darkness and racing through light, we have persisted in the creation of a Canadian civilization.”-Her Excellency the Right Honourable Adrienne Clarkson, October 7, 1999
Multiculturalism
Building Canada
During the latter half of the 19th and first half of the 20th centuries, Canada pursued an immigration policy that had as its primary objective supplying a labour pool, first for settlement and agriculture, then to support industrialization.
Through much of this period, Canadian governments gradually reflected society’s increasing willingness to accept differences within the population--specifically, the legitimacy of the rights of minorities to maintain their culture and traditions. However, there were also regressive laws during this time that among other things stripped some Canadians of their citizenship rights, such as Canadians of Japanese descent during World War II. In cases like these, Canadian governments failed to provide for the full participation of certain minorities in society and the legitimacy of multiple identities.
After World War II, Canadians and their governments began to see that continued discrimination at home devalued the purpose of the sacrifices that had been made in defeating a racist regime overseas. Beginning in 1950 with the report of the Massey-Lévesque Commission, ethnocultural diversity gradually came to be understood as an essential ingredient in a distinct Canadian identity.
The Bill of Rights in 1960 barred discrimination by federal agencies on the grounds of race, national origin, colour, religion or sex. Changes to Canada’s Immigration Act in 1962 specifically stated that “any suitably qualified person from any part of the world could be considered for immigration to Canada, without regard to his race, colour, national origin, or the country from which he comes”. As a consequence, Canada’s immigration polices gradually became less European and the mix of source countries shifted to nations in Southern Europe, Asia and the West Indies. Substantial increases during the 1970s and 1980s in the number of immigrants admitted as refugees under humanitarian and compassionate grounds further diversified the ethnocultural origins of newcomers to Canada.
“It is hereby declared to be the policy of the Government of Canada to foster the recognition and appreciation of the diverse cultures of Canadian society and promote the reflection and the evolving expressions of those cultures.”-Excerpt from the Canadian Multiculturalism Act, July 1988
In 1971, Canada became the first country in the world to adopt an official Multiculturalism Policy. This policy provided for programs and services to support ethnocultural associations and to help individuals overcome barriers to their full participation in Canadian society. In 1982, the multicultural character of Canada gained constitutional recognition in Section 27 of the newly adopted Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. It specified that the courts were to interpret the Charter “in a manner consistent with the preservation and enhancement of the multicultural heritage of Canada”. By virtue of this section of the Charter, Canada became a constitutional multicultural state.
In 1950, when the landmark Massey-Lévesque Commission linked cultural diversity and Canadian identity, 92% of Canada’s population growth was a product of the birth rate. Today, immigration has outpaced the natural birth rate, and accounts for 53% of overall population growth. Often dubbed “the global village in one country”, the face of Canada, particularly in our larger urban centres, is changing dramatically. By 2006, one in six Canadians will be a member of a visible minority. Toronto, the largest city in Canada’s largest province, will be the world’s most multicultural city, ahead of New York and London. Vancouver, with the fastest growing and most diverse immigrant population in Canada, will be among the world’s most integrated cities.
Moving Forward
Healing Canada’s relationship with its Aboriginal Peoples
Lessons learned through experience with bilingualism and multiculturalism have taught Canada that acceptance and understanding of differences between peoples make collective development possible. However, experience with diversity also shows that inequities must be acknowledged and addressed for a diverse people to move forward together. This is a slow and sometimes painful process, but it is essential if all Canadians are to enjoy the same sense of belonging and attachment to their country. It also serves to familiarize Canadians with the history they share and the obligations that their history confers. These obligations include honouring the proclamations and negotiated arrangements made with First Nations peoples.
Infringements of the human rights of Aboriginal peoples date back to Canada’s earliest beginnings. Violations such as the residential school system occurred as recently as a few decades ago. The effects for many individuals and communities are plainly evident. Aboriginal Canadians suffer more poverty, poorer health, higher death and suicide rates and far greater unemployment than their fellow citizens do.
In the modern era, attempts to address the needs of Canada’s Aboriginal peoples began in 1973 when the Supreme Court of Canada first recognized land rights based on an Aboriginal group’s traditional use and occupancy of land. In 1982, the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms recognized and affirmed the treaty rights of Aboriginal peoples to protect their cultures, customs, traditions and languages. In 1996, the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples presented a comprehensive five-volume report to the Parliament of Canada identifying the legal, political, social, economic and cultural issues that need to be addressed to ensure the future survival of Canada’s First Nations, Inuit and Métis peoples. Two years later the federal government responded with Gathering Strength: Canada’s Aboriginal Action Plan to work in partnership with Canada’s Aboriginal peoples to improve health, housing and public safety, strengthen economic development and assist with the implementation of self-government.
As with official languages and multiculturalism, Canada has learned that constitutional measures and legislation alone are not enough to assure equal opportunity in a diverse society. To contribute fully and achieve their full potential, all peoples must have a voice in society and a chance to shape the future direction of the country of which they are a part. This requires mechanisms to enable individuals and groups to speak out and be heard, and to participate in national debates. It also requires programs that help equip individuals, communities and organizations with the skills and tools they need to advance their interests.
“The assistance and spiritual values of the Aboriginal peoples who welcomed the newcomers to this continent too often have been forgotten. The contributions made by all Aboriginal peoples to Canada’s development, and the contributions that they continue to make to our society today, have not been properly acknowledged. The Government of Canda today, on behalf of all Canadians, acknowledges those contributions.”-Hon. Jane Stewart, Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development, unveiling of Gathering Strength: Canada’s Aboriginal Action Plan, 1998
Valuing our Diversity
Contributing to the World
Canada has embraced diversity, or cultural pluralism as some people refer to it, in both policy and practice. It is viewed as one of Canada’s most important attributes, socially and economically. Canadians value diversity for enriching cultural expression and making daily life more varied and interesting. Businesses and employers recognize that diversity in the workplace promotes innovation, stimulates teamwork and creativity and helps expand markets for goods and services. As the diversity of the population expands, new links are forged with the world at a time when Canadians recognize the increasing importance of having a credible voice in international affairs and in strengthening our advantage in the global economy.
Our advantage lies in having been a multicultural society from our earliest days. The foundation has already been laid for constructive co-existence among culturally and racially diverse communities. And the close links these communities enjoy with virtually every country on earth lead the Government of Canada to be enthusiastic about the economic potential of multiculturalism.
These same links - so critical for the development of Canadian trade, jobs and investment - can also be exploited to reinforce Canada’s stature among the nations of the world. Experience with diversity has taught us to accept and respect diverse views. Canadians welcome debate and are willing to listen, discuss, negotiate and compromise for the common good. This has made us effective international mediators. We understand the virtues of accommodation and respect, and the importance of negotiation in peaceful conflict resolution. With so much violence in the world fuelled by racial, religious and ethnic intolerance, Canada is regularly asked by developing nations and newly emerging democracies to provide advice and assistance on conflict resolution, human rights, democratization and establishing the institutions that a civil society needs.
Many of the national achievements that Canadians are proudest of have involved our contributions to world peace and human security. These include the work of our peacekeepers and our role in ratifying the land mines treaty and establishing the International War Crimes Tribunal.
However, it is what millions of individual Canadians achieve every day that matters most. Canada stands as proof that it is possible for women and men of the world’s many races, religions and cultures to live together. We admit our problems and work across our differences to find solutions. We show the world that different people can accept and respect one another, and work collaboratively to build one of the most open, resilient, creative and caring societies on earth.
“The essence of inclusiveness is that we are part of a society in which language, colour, education, sex and money need not, should not divide us, but can make us more aware and sensitive to difference.” -Her Excellency the Right Honourable Adrienne Clarkson, October 7, 1999
Challenges and Opportunities Ahead
Building a higher quality of life for all Canadians
While our record in recognizing the rights of all our peoples is far from perfect, Canada has learned a great deal from its diversity. Accepting and then coming to value the differences between our peoples has changed and continues to change Canada, making our country a better place. However, as Canadians look to the future it is clear that new pressures will make balancing diversity and unity even more challenging.
Canada has managed its increasing diversity and maintained unity by balancing rights and responsibilities in citizenship, and individual and collective rights in our Constitution. However, the global forces of change that affect all countries affect Canada too. The diversity of the Canadian populace is increasing faster than at any time in our history. Communications technologies--satellites, computers and the Internet--are fundamentally changing relationships, transactions and expectations in our economy and in our society. And with exports accounting for more than 40% of our GDP, Canada is affected by the evolution towards “one market, one world” as increased international trade makes the globe smaller and its peoples more interconnected and interdependent.
The ethnocultural diversity of Canada’s population is a major advantage when access to global markets is more important than ever to our economic prosperity. Protecting this advantage means that steps to eradicate racism are essential. Beyond the inequity, suffering and social disruption that intolerance and racism causes, Canada cannot afford to have any of its citizens marginalized.
As a knowledge-based economy in an increasingly competitive global marketplace, every mind matters. All Canadians must have the opportunity to develop and contribute to their full potential.
As a consequence, the Government of Canada is working with provincial and territorial governments, the private and voluntary sectors and individual Canadians to help strengthen our institutions, build safer and more supportive communities and reinforce shared values. For example, the Government of Canada is working to make the federal public service more representative of the diverse population it serves.
It is enhancing its multiculturalism programming, expanding its anti-racism activities and strengthening its support for other minority groups such as persons with disabilities to help more individual Canadians overcome barriers to their full participation in society.
The Government is also working to increase access to all forms of Canadian cultural expression in all media. A major effort is under way to digitize the holdings of Canada’s cultural institutions and link them to form a virtual museum of Canada. These and many other efforts will help ensure that, as the world becomes smaller and our connections with other countries deepen, we can use new technologies to strengthen our society - to find and connect with one another, share our stories and perspectives, and work together for the common good while maintaining a strong sense of place and of pride in being Canadian.
In these and many other ways we can ensure that change works to Canada’s advantage--that our diversity remains a source of strength and creativity, and that it continues to play a pivotal role in making Canada a modern, forward-looking country.
“We have established a distinct Canadian Way, a distinct Canadian model: Accommodation of cultures. Recognition of diversity. A partnership between citizens and state. A balance that promotes individual freedom and economic prosperity while at the same time sharing risks and benefits.” -the Right Honourable Jean Chretien, Prime Minister of Canada, June 2000
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Bill Cosby wasn’t talking about affirmative action when he made his remarks late last month, criticizing the failure of some African Americans to meet standards of decent behavior. But it should surprise no one that those most unhappy with Cosby’s criticism are the people most enamored of preferences based on race and ethnicity.
There are really two principles at stake in the current debate over racial and ethnic preferences or, more broadly, civil rights, or, more broadly still, racial and ethnic relations. The first is whether we ought to encourage discrimination on the basis of race and ethnicity; the second is whether we ought to allow discrimination on the basis of merit.
Once upon a time, the Left opposed racial discrimination. It argued that it was unfair to let racial considerations trump qualifications based on merit. The principle of nondiscrimination carried the day in the 1960s, and it was enshrined into law in various statutes. But these statutes have not resulted in proportional representation for some groups, particularly African Americans, at the upper reaches of our elites. And so now, ironically, it is the Left that pushes racial preferences and denigrates merit.
There are both charitable and uncharitable ways to explain this. The charitable explanation is that the Left cares so deeply about integration that it is willing to sacrifice or bend considerations of merit. If you insist on integration, and merit stands in the way, then you must sacrifice merit. The less charitable explanation is that the Left has never been comfortable — or, perhaps, with the ascendancy of deconstructionists and other certain kinds of Leftists, it has become less comfortable — with the whole notion of merit.
As African Americans disproportionately failed to succeed, in any event, excuses were made. Once upon a time, segregation and institutionalized discrimination were serious, formidable, ubiquitous obstacles. Removing them improved blacks’ status and opportunities, but other obstacles remained, or grew, like illegitimacy, crime, substance abuse, and failing to make the most of the greater opportunities given. To attack these problems, however, was not in the Left’s repertoire; it was “blaming the victim.” It was easier to continue to blame discrimination, present and past — even if present discrimination is dramatically and undeniably less, and even if the legacy of past discrimination must be exaggerated. And the Left also started to attack merit itself.
I am using “merit” broadly to mean “standards” of all kinds. I am not saying that reasonable people cannot differ about whether high-school grades are more or less important than SAT scores in predicting academic performance in college, to give an obvious example. The Left likes to paint the opponents of preferences as wishing to make university admissions mechanically. This is not so. Choose whatever standards you like, but do so honestly and apply them equally to all. But one suspects that a significant part of the Left really doesn’t want standards, period.
They don’t like the SAT, of course, and they really don’t like the whole notion that some individuals are thought to be smarter or to work harder than others. They love making it illegal for employers and educators to use selection criteria that have a “disparate impact” on minority groups — having a high-school diploma, for instance — no matter that the criteria are neutral on their face, as applied, and as intended, and were adopted for nondiscriminatory reasons. They don’t like laws that say convicted criminals can’t vote, even those still in prison.
They love multiculturalism. The relativists favor multiculturalism because they don’t believe that one culture can be superior to another. They oppose assimilation for the same reason. Assimilation can be favored only if we believe that one culture is preferable to others and ought to be dominant.
So long as applicants meet “a minimum test score,” liberal civil-rights professor Lani Guinier is happy to have university admissions made by “what is in effect a lottery for admission among the applicants who meet the minimum standard.” Of course. This makes it statistically certain that no group will be “underrepresented” or “overrepresented,” whether that group is racial, ethnic, sexual, whatever (so long as they all apply in the right proportions). The only problem is that the less qualified are as likely to get in as the more qualified. But if you reject the whole concept of qualifications, then what does that matter?
Well, there are in fact many problems with this kind of egalitarianism. By not rewarding talent and industry, we fail to encourage them. There are, likewise, benefits to a stratified higher education system. It better ensures that each student can have the most demanded of him or her, can be given an environment most tailor-made to his or her potential. Society — as well as the individuals involved — ultimately reaps the rewards when hard work and industry are rewarded. And society will suffer if we refuse to acknowledge differences between, say, criminals and non-criminals — those who steal “pound cake” and those who don’t, in Cosby’s words.
It is wrong to discriminate on the basis of race and ethnicity; it is foolish not to discriminate on the basis of merit. And so the Left’s program of favoring the former and opposing the latter is both wrong and foolish. Whatever Cosby’s views on affirmative action, he believes in merit, and that is enough to make many people uncomfortable.
— Roger Clegg is general counsel of the Center for Equal Opportunity in Sterling, Virginia.
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