It's not what you think: How structural dynamics and implicit bias reproduce racial hierarchy in the age of Obama
1. john a. powell
Executive Director, Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity
Williams Chair in Civil Rights & Civil Liberties, Moritz College of Law
Lassiter Conference on Structural Racialization
UK School of Law
February 25, 2011
2. Racial possibilities in the age of Obama
Structural Racialization
Arrangement of structures
Public/Private?
Corporate Prerogative and race
Mind Science
Challenging our biases
2
3. Why does race continue to play
such a critical role in determining
societal outcomes?
Haven’t we entered a post-racial
moment with the election of
Barack Obama?
While significant, Obama’s
victory does not erase the
persistent inequalities that
hinder the life chances for
marginalized groups 3
4. Black and Latino children are much more likely than
white children to attend high-poverty schools
A white man with a criminal record is three times
more likely than a black man with a record to receive
consideration for a job
Minority home-seekers with good credit scores
steered to high-cost, sub-prime mortgages thus
devastating their communities in light of the
foreclosure crisis
By prematurely proclaiming a post-racial status, we
ignore the distance we have yet to travel to make this
country truly a land of equal opportunity for all,
regardless of racial identity. 4
5. President Obama’s election “suggests that a sea change in
race relations has already occurred”
However, his “exceptional racial background” and the fact he
was elected in the midst of national crises indicates “race
hasn’t been overcome so much as temporarily superseded.”
These crises could worsen racial resentment
“race forms a basis for the exploitation and hoarding of
material, political, and cultural resources; in turn, the same
processes that facilitate racial stratification continually
reconstitute race.”
Source: Lopez, Ian Haney. Post-Racial Racism: Crime Control and Racial Stratification in the Age of Obama 5
6. We have fluidity in terms of racial identities
▪ Situations affect who you are, how you identify.
▪ For example, it may not be until you’re in a
room with full of people of a different race that
you become truly aware of your own race.
▪ The British did not become “white” until
Africans became “black.”
• In order to notice race, society has to create this
category/idea of race. After it is created, individuals
can negotiate it using the social tools created by
society.
6
7. Although racial attitudes are improving, racial
disparities persist on every level.
Inequity arises as disenfranchised groups are left
out of the democratic process.
Source: www.cartoonstock.com
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8. Membership, the most important
good that we distribute to one
another in human community
(Michael Walzer)
◦ Prior in importance even to freedom
◦ Citizenship, a precondition to
freedom
◦ Membership, a precondition to
citizenship
Distribution of membership
Cost to not belong
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9. The cost of membership in a democratic society
Current estimate for family of four: $48,778*
▪ Over three times as many families fall below family
budget thresholds as fall below the official poverty line
How far do you fall (children in extreme poverty,
skyrocketing bankruptcy rates, family homelessness)?
Are all neighborhoods are neighborhoods of
sustainable opportunity?
Source: James Lin and Jared Bernstein, What we need to get by. October 29, 2008 |
EPI Briefing Paper #224 9
10. Conscious and Pattern
Unconscious (i.e. recognition and
implicit bias) generalization
Categorization
Inequalit
This may
y
change over
time, but the
Emulation
Hoarding and and whole
Exploitation Adaptation structure is
highly inert
Source: Douglas Massey. Categorically Unequal: The American Stratification System. New York: Russell Sage Foundation. 2007. 10
12. How race works today
There are still practices, cultural norms and
institutional arrangements that help create and
maintain (disparate) racialized outcomes
Structural racialization addresses inter-
institutionalarrangements and interactions
It refers to the ways in which the joint operation
of institutions produce racialized outcomes
▪ In this analysis, outcomes matter more than intent
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13. Context: The Dominant Consensus on Race
National values Contemporary culture
Current Manifestations: Social and Institutional Dynamics
Processes that maintain racial Racialized public policies and
hierarchies institutional practices
Outcomes: Racial Disparities
Racial inequalities in current levels of Capacity for individual and community
well-being improvement is undermined
Ongoing Racial Inequalities
13
Adapted from the Aspen Roundtable on Community Change. “Structural Racism and Community Building.” June 2004
14. • One variable can explain
why differential outcomes.
…to a multi-dimensional understanding….
• Structural Inequality
– Example: a Bird in a cage.
Examining one bar cannot
explain why a bird cannot fly.
But multiple bars, arranged
in specific ways, reinforce
each other and trap the bird.
14
15. • Understanding the
relationships among
these multiple
dimensions, and how
these complex intra-
actions change
processes
• Relationships are
neither static nor
discrete
15
16. Physical
Social Cultural
Outcomes
These structures interact in ways that produce racialized outcomes for
different groups… 16
17. Racialized… Spatialized… Globalized…
• In 1960, African- • marginalized people • Economic
American families in of color and the very
poverty were 3.8 times globalization
poor have been
more likely to be spatially isolated
concentrated in high- from opportunity via • Climate change
poverty neighborhoods reservations, Jim
than poor whites. Crow, Appalachian
mountains, ghettos, • the Credit and
• In 2000, they were 7.3 barrios, and the Foreclosure crisis
times more likely. culture of
incarceration.
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18. LOW OPPORTUNITY HIGH OPPORTUNITY
• Less than 25% of students in • The year my step daughter
Detroit finish high school finished high school, 100% of
the students graduated and
• More than 60% of the men 100% went to college
will spend time in jail
• Most will not even drive by a
• There may soon be no bus jail
service in some areas • Free bus service
• It is difficult to attract jobs or • Relatively easy to attract
private capital capital
• Not safe; very few parks • Very safe; great parks
• Difficult to get fresh food • Easy to get fresh food 18
20. How can we be sensitive to
inter- and intra-group
differences?
How do the ladders or
pathways of opportunities
differ for different people?
Every institution has built in
assumptions, i.e. “stairways”
are a pathway – but not for
people in wheelchairs, baby
strollers.
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21. …Some people ride the …Others have to run up
“Up” escalator to reach the “Down” escalator to
opportunity get there
21
22. People are “differentially situated”
Not only are People are
people situated impacted by the
differently with relationships
regard to between
institutions, institutions and
people are systems…
situated
differently with …but people
regard to also impact
infrastructure these
relationships
and can change
the structure of
the system.
22
23. We come from different places. Illuminating people’s
different and shared experiences of oppression
encourages collective action with others whose
experiences may be slightly different.
Young’s 5 Faces of Oppression: Different
groups/people experience one or more of these
faces throughout their lives
Exploitation
Marginalization
Powerlessness
Cultural Dominance
Violence
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Source: Grassroots Policy Project. “Faces of Oppression.” http://www.grassrootspolicy.org/node/85
24. Segregation impacts a number of life-opportunities
Impacts on Health
School Segregation
Impacts on Educational Achievement
Exposure to crime; arrest
Transportation limitations and other
inequitable public services
Neighborhood Job segregation
Segregation
Racial stigma, other psychological
impacts
Impacts on community power and
individual assets
Source: Barbara Reskin (http://faculty.washington.edu/reskin/) 24
25. Zoning laws prevent affordable housing
development in many suburbs
Municipalities subsidize the relocation of
businesses out of the city
Transportation spending favors highways,
metropolitan expansion and urban sprawl
Court decisions prevent metropolitan school
desegregation
School funding is tied to property taxes
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26. How we arrange structures matters
The order of the structures
The timing of the interaction between them
The relationships that exist between them
We must be aware of how structures are arranged
in order to fully understand social phenomena
26
27. One cannot have a just society unless the
arrangement of institutions are just
-John Rawls
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28. The government plays a central role in the
arrangement of space and opportunities
These arrangements are not “neutral” or
“natural” or “colorblind”
Social and racial inequities are geographically
inscribed
There is a polarization between the rich and
the poor that is directly related to the areas in
which they live
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29. Racialized policies and structures:
Promoted sprawl
Concentrated subsidized housing
Led to disparities between schools
▪ Achievement gap
▪ Discipline rates
▪ Funding disparities
▪ Economic segregation
▪ Graduation rates
▪ Racial segregation
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31. Today…
Institutions and structures
continue to support, not
dismantle, the status quo.
This is why we continue to
see racially inequitable
outcomes even if there is
good intent behind policies,
or an absence of racist
actors. (i.e. structural
racialization)
31
32. A series of mutually reinforcing federal
policies across multiple domains have
contributed to the disparities we see today
School Desegregation
Homeownership/Suburbanization
Urban Renewal
Public Housing
Transportation
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33. Distinction blurred
Examples:
Private colleges
Housing as a private good
complemented by
government policies
GI Bill
Expansion of highway system
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac
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34. Civil Rights Act of 1875 – equal treatment in
“public accommodations”
Citizenship clause and membership in political
community
Overturned by Supreme Court eight years later
“The wrongful act of an individual, unsupported by
any such authority, is simply a private wrong, or a
crime of that individual”
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35. Private vs. public
discrimination
Tension between addressing
state action vs. de facto
conditions produced by
“private” decisions
Source: CSUN Daily Sundial Newspaper
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36. “What the nation, through Congress,
has sought to accomplish in reference
to that race is, what had already been
done in every state in the Union for the
white race, to secure and protect rights
belonging to them as freemen and
citizens; nothing more. The one
underlying purpose of congressional
legislation has been to enable the black
race to take the rank of mere citizens.”
36
37. "The distinction between government
and private action, furthermore, can
be amorphous both as a historical
matter and as a matter of present-day
finding of fact. Laws arise from a
culture and vice versa. Neither can
assign to the other all responsibility for
persisting injustices.”
37
38. Misidentifying the
situation, not
public vs. private Public Private
Private
Expansion of
corporate
prerogative
Domains
Corporate
Corporate space
diminishes public Non-pubic Corporate
&private space
38
39. Corporations under control of state for much of US
history – serving a public function
Natural entity theory:
corporations as
separate juridical
entities with separate
rights
Fourteenth
amendment and
corporate
personhood
Source: Terrence Nowicki Jr. ThisIsHistoricTimes.com 39
40. Taney Court: states’ rights, anti-elitism and
denial of citizenship to blacks
“provided a coherent defense of both corporations
and slavery in a rapidly democratizing union”
(Austin Allen)
Corporate dominance connected to whiteness
“middle-stratum identity” (Martinot)
Citizens United: expansion of corporate rights
and reduction of civil rights
Source: powell, j. and C. Watt.“Corporate Prerogative, Race, and Identity Under the Fourteenth
Amendment.” Cardoza Law Review Vol. 32:3.
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41. Capitalist Welfare State
Property Owning Democracy
John Rawls: Justice as Fairness
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42. CORNEL WEST: “…I don’t think President
Bush individually hates black people. His
policies were racist in effect and consequence,
and especially classist in terms of generating
misery among poor and working people,
disproportionately black and brown…And I
would say that even about the Obama
administration.” (Democracy Now!)
42
43. The twentieth century has been
characterized by three developments of
political importance:
1)the growth of democracy;
2)the growth of corporate power; and
3)the growth of propaganda as a means of
protecting corporate power against democracy
(Alex Carey)
43
45. Treasury report February 2011: “Reforming
America’s Housing Finance Market”
Does not mention role of segregation in housing and
credit markets in subprime crisis
Three options laid out: variations of privatization
Potentially mortgage costs, down payments,
fees/costs for FHA loans
Disproportionate impact on people of color and low-
income communities
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47. Targeted Universalism recognizes racial
disparities and the importance of eradicating
them, while acknowledging their presence
within a larger inequitable, institutional
framework
Targeted universalism is a common framework
through which to pursue justice.
A model which recognizes our linked fate
A model where we all grow together
A model where we embrace collective
solutions
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51. Only 2% of emotional
cognition is available to us
consciously
Racial bias tends to reside in
the unconscious network
Messages can be framed to
speak to our unconscious
51
52. Racial attitudes operate in our “unconscious” (also
called “subconscious”) mind
Usually invisible to us but significantly influences
our positions on critical issues
Negative unconscious attitudes about race are
called “implicit bias” or “symbolic racism.”
52
56. When scientists showed a similar sketch to people from East Africa - a culture
containing few angular visual cues - the family is seen sitting under a tree. The
woman is balancing an item on her head.
Westerners are accustomed to the corners and box-like shapes of architecture. They
are more likely to place the family indoors and to interpret the rectangle above the
woman's head as a window through which shrubbery can be seen. 56
57. Race is a social reality
While we are hardwired to categorize in-
group vs. out-group, we are “softwired” for
the content of those categories
Softwiring is social
Racial categories and meaning
can be constantly be reconfigured
57
58. High
Pitied Esteemed
Out-Group In-Group
Warmth
Despised Envied
Out-Group Out-Group
Low
Low High
Competence
Source: Douglas Massey. Categorically Unequal: The American Stratification System. New York: Russell Sage Foundation. 2007. 58
59. High
Pity : Esteemed:
women, Your own group,
elderly, who you identify
disabled with
Warmth
Despised:
Envied:
African
Competent, but
Americans,
don’t really like
Undocumented
them: Asians
Low immigrants
Low High
Competence
Source: Douglas Massey. Categorically Unequal: The American Stratification System. New York: Russell Sage Foundation. 2007. 59
60. Unconscious biases are reflected in institutional
arrangements
Prejudice leads to outcomes, and the outcomes
reinforce the stereotypes / prejudice
Ex: Females aren’t good at math.
Many females don’t take math classes.
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62. Our environment affects our unconscious
networks
Priming activates mental associations
Telling someone a scary story activates a frame of fear
Claude Steele’s “stereotype threat”:
For example, tell students about to take a test that
Asian students tend to do better than whites, and the
whites will perform significantly worse than if they had
not been primed to think of themselves as less capable
than Asians
Source: http://www.eaop.ucla.edu/0405/Ed185%20-Spring05/Week_6_May9_2005.pdf 62
63. Experiment with 7th graders; ~50% white & 50% Black
Given a list of values
▪ Experimental group: Choose the values that are most
important to you and write why they are important
▪ Control group: Choose the values that are the least important
to you and explain why
End of semester – While Black students still did not do as
well as whites, the Black students in the experimental
group showed a 40% reduction in racial achievement gap
Experiment was repeated with a group of college
students and yielded a 50% reduction in the racial
achievement gap
Source: Cohen, Geoffrey L.., Julio Garcia, Nancy Apfel, and Allison Master. (2006). “Reducing the Racial Achievement Gap: A
Social-Psychological Intervention.” Science 313(5791): 1307-1310, 63
64. Be aware of implicit bias in your life. We are
constantly being primed
Debias by presenting positive alternatives
Consider your conscious messaging & language.
Affirmative action support varies based on whether it’s
presented as “assistance” or “preference”
Engage in proactive affirmative efforts – not only
on the cultural level but also the structural level
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