STRUCTURAL RACIALIZATION: A LENS FOR UNDERSTANDING HOW OPPORTUNITY IS RACIALIZED john a. powell Director, Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity Williams Chair in Civil Rights & Civil Liberties, Moritz College of Law July 9-11, 2009 ISAIAH
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Structural Racialization: A Lens for Understanding How Opportunity is Racialized
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STRUCTURAL RACIALIZATION: A LENS FOR UNDERSTANDING HOW
OPPORTUNITY IS RACIALIZEDjohn a. powell
Director, Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and EthnicityWilliams Chair in Civil Rights & Civil Liberties, Moritz College of Law
July 9-11, 2009ISAIAH
Today’s Conversation
Different types of racism Individual Institutional Structural racialization
Why use a structural racialization analysis?
Using structural racialization analysis to promote change
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Key Takeaways
Structural racialization addresses inter-institutional arrangements and interactions. It shows how the joint operation of institutions can produce racialized outcomes.
Once we are able to see the multiple, intersecting, and often mutually reinforcing disadvantages of structural racialization, we develop more effective responses.
A structural racialization analysis allows us to recognize that people are situated differently inside of existing structures.
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Individual
Institutional
Structural Racialization
Types of Racism
Individual Racism Discrimination Model
Victim/perpetrator Prejudice (bad actor/ bad apple) Intent (purpose or motive)
Recognized that racism need not be individualist or intentional.
Institutional and cultural practices can perpetuate race inequality without relying on racist actors. Jim Crow
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Institutional Racism
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Dominant public paradigms explaining disparities: “bad apples” Defective culture Individual faults Personal Racism
Overlooks policies and arrangements: “diseased tree” Structures Institutions Cumulative causation
Attribution of Disparities
The Arrangement of Structures 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
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Ex: Structural Arrangements and Unemployment
Jobs are distributed through structures. Most teachers are women. Most construction workers are men.
When unemployment rates change, we need to be conscious of how people are segregated into economic sectors.
There are racial and gendered outcomes to these structural arrangements.
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The Importance of Institutional Arrangements
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Contrasting Perspectives
Traditional Understanding {-} Structural Understanding {+}
An independent-isolated-individual psychological issue
An outcome that results from interactivity of institutions & actors
De jure De facto
Static Dynamic
Past, if present an anomaly Present
Overt Overt and covert
Irrational Rational
Tautological Non-tautological (multidimensional)
Bonilla-Silva, Eduardo (1997)
Structural Racialization
How race works today: There are still practices, cultural norms and institutional arrangements that help create & maintain (disparate) racialized outcomes
Structural racialization addresses inter-institutional arrangements 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.
13 Adapted from the Aspen Roundtable on Community Change. “Structural Racism and Community Building.” June 2004
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Structural Racialization
Structural racialization accounts for the cumulative effects of institutional arrangements. Causation is interactive between institutions.
Lower Educational
Outcomes for Urban
School Districts
Increased Flight
of Affluent Families from Urban Areas
Neighborhood (Housing)
Segregation
SchoolSegregatio
n
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These cows are ill. Why?
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Photo source: AP
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Mutual Institutional Interaction
Employment
Housing
Childcare
Effective Participation
HealthEducation
Transportation
An analysis of any one area will yield an incomplete
understanding.
We must consider how institutions
interact with one another to
produce racialized outcomes.
Structural Racialization Analysis Applied
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Subsidized Housing Policies
DiscriminatoryAnd Unfair Lending
A Housing MarketThat Does Not Serve
the Population
Racial SteeringAnd Discrimination
ExclusionaryZoning
Housing Challeng
es
Application of SR Model:Thompson v. HUD
In 1995, six families living in Baltimore public housing filed suit on behalf of 14,000 other low-income families.
In 2005, a federal court ruled that HUD had violated Title
VIII of the Fair Housing Act by failing to affirmatively further fair housing.
HUD had effectively restricted low-income minority families to segregated neighborhoods in the central city.
During the 1990s, 89% of public housing units developed with HUD’s support in the Baltimore Region were in Baltimore City.
The majority – more than 67%– of the City’s Section 8 voucher holders live in census tracts that are 70% - 100% Black.
What benefits do we gain from using this analysis?
What do we lose when we fail to embrace this analysis?
Why Use a Structural Racialization Analysis?
SR Analysis: Uncovers Complexities We understand that racism produces negative
outcomes.
When we have proof of racism, this can clearly lead to a call for action to combat it.
But what about when there are disparities and the source(s) of the racism is/are unclear?
Structural racialization often operates in this more stealth manner.
The call for social action against the racism often is less urgent. 22
SR Analysis: Provides Context A structural analysis is deeply relational and
timebound.
Example: the subprime crisis. “People got bad loans.”
A surface view solution: “Stop giving people bad loans.”
Contextualized view (SR analysis) solution: Fix the dual credit market, stop spatial segregation/redlining, work toward stable home-equity building, etc.
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Systems Theory Highlights Relationships
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It is critical in systems
thinking and structural
racialization to
realize that people are situated
differently inside of existing
structures.
Source: Barbara Reskin. http://faculty.uwashington.edu/reskin/
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Using A Structural Racialization Analysis to Produce Change
When we use race properly, we can show how structural dynamics and failings hurt everyone – linked fate
Begin to analyze how housing, education, employment, transportation, health care, and other systems interact to yield racialized outcomes for different groups.
Structural racialization as an analytical toolis a particular example of a systems approach.
“We need to look at the individual in terms of many different relationships to him/herself, many things in relationship to his/her community and to the larger community, not just in isolation. If we take this approach seriously, it affects how we see the world, how we experience ourselves, how we do our work, and helps move us to a truly inclusive paradigm.”
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~john a. powell
Eliminating Structural Racialization
A top-down approach to eliminating structural racialization will not work.
Community members must be involved and given a voice to help shape a new paradigm.
Hence, coalition and community building are key elements in any strategy for challenging structural racialization.
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A Transformative Agenda
Transformative change in the racial paradigm in the U.S. requires substantive efforts in three areas:
Talking about race: Understanding how language and messages shape reality and the perception of reality
Thinking about race: Understanding how framing and priming impact information processing in both the explicit and the implicit mind
Linking these understandings to the way that we act on race and how we arrange our institutions and policies
Questions or Comments? For More Information, Visit Us Online:www.KirwanInstitute.org
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APPENDIX
The Pathway to Opportunity
Minnesota data
Opportunity Matters: Space, Place, and Life Outcomes
“Opportunity” is a situation or condition that places individuals in a position to be more likely to succeed or excel.
Opportunity structures are critical to opening pathways to success:
High-quality education Healthy and safe environment Stable housing Sustainable employment Political empowerment Outlets for wealth-building Positive social networks
Section 2
Opportunity Matters: Neighborhoods & Access to Opportunity Your environment has a
profound impact on your access to opportunity and likelihood of success
High poverty areas with poor employment, underperforming schools, distressed housing and public health/safety risks depress life outcomes A system of disadvantage Many manifestations
Urban, rural, suburban
People of color are far more likely to live in opportunity deprived neighborhoods and communities
Factors Contributing to Residential Segregation and Isolation
De facto segregation and opportunity isolation Exclusionary zoning
Subtle forms of housing discriminationRacial steering, editorializing
Fragmented school districts and court decisions
Economic development policy, infrastructure policy and subsidized housing policy
Continued exurban sprawl and white flight
Reverse redliningBuy here pay here, rent to own, payday lending,
Structural racialization involves a series of exclusions, often anchored in (and perpetuating) spatial segregation.
Historically marginalized people of color and the very poor have been spatially isolated from economic, political, educational and technological power via reservations, Jim Crow, Appalachian mountains, ghettos, barrios, and the culture of incarceration.
Neighborhood
Segregation
School Segregation
Racial stigma, other psychological impacts
Job segregation
Impacts on community power and individual
assets
Impacts on Educational Achievement
The Cumulative Impacts of Spatial, Racial and Opportunity Segregation
Exposure to crime; arrest
Transportation limitations and other inequitable public services
Adapted from figure by Barbara Reskin at: http://faculty.washington.edu/reskin/
Segregation impacts a number of life-opportunities
Urban Institute and Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured estimates based on the Census Bureau's March 2007 and 2008 Current Population Survey (CPS: Annual Social and Economic Supplements).
46“Communities in Crisis: Race and Mortgage Lending in the Twin Cities.” Institute on Race and Poverty. Feb. 2009
Subprime Loans- Refinance
47“Communities in Crisis: Race and Mortgage Lending in the Twin Cities.” Institute on Race and Poverty. Feb. 2009
Relationship Between Race & Foreclosures
48“Communities in Crisis: Race and Mortgage Lending in the Twin Cities.” Institute on Race and Poverty. Feb. 2009
Subprime Lending & Foreclosures
49“Communities in Crisis: Race and Mortgage Lending in the Twin Cities.” Institute on Race and Poverty. Feb. 2009
Implications of Opportunity Isolation
Individual
Poor economic outcomes, lower educational outcomes, degraded asset development
Poor health conditions, higher exposure and risk from crime
Psychological distress, weak social and professional networks
Community/Economy
High social costs, distressed and stressed communities, fiscal challenges
Weakened civic engagement and democratic participation Underdeveloped human capital, poor labor outlook, poor
economic development prospects
Opening Pathways to Opportunity What happens when we affirmatively connect people to
opportunity?
After implementing economically diverse magnets schools in Wake County, NC, African American student test scores doubled
Children in public housing who moved to the suburbs as part of Chicago’s Gautreaux program were twice as likely to attend college (in comparison to their urban peers) (Rosenbaum)
Despite the flaws in the implementation of MTO, many participants experienced substantial psychological benefits
Moving to opportunity for boys resulted in a 25% decline in depressive/anxiety or dependency problems (2005)