Race, Place, and Opportunity: The Role of Structures in (Re)Producing Inequality
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
The Thomas Jefferson District of the Unitarian Universalist
Association of Congregations 2010 Anti-racism Conference-
Building the World We Want: Race, Place and Community
October 9, 2010 Richmond, VA
2. Race, place, and the distribution of opportunity
Opportunity isolation
How structures create, maintain, and perpetuate racial
disparities
How race operates in U.S. society
Social construction of race
Implicit bias
Framing
Ensuring equitable access to opportunities for all
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3. District Vision Statement:
“We are a vibrant, diverse faith community of
healthy congregations that is a prophetic
model of anti-racism and anti-oppression. We
are called to collaborate with other faith and
community groups to transform our society.”
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7. Opportunity includes access to:
Healthcare
Education
Employment
Services
Healthy food
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8. Individual/family costs Societal cost
Living in “concentrated Neighborhoods of
disadvantage” reduces student concentrated poverty
IQ by 4 points, roughly the suppress property values by
equivalent to missing one year nearly 400 billion nationwide
of school (Sampson 2007) (Galster et al. 2007))
People of color are far more likely to live in
opportunity-deprived neighborhoods and
communities.
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9. It’s more than just a matter of choice.
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Photo: Sxc.hu; roniebow
10. Racialized… Spatialized… Globalized…
• In 1960, African- • Marginalized • Economic
American families in people of color and globalization
poverty were 3.8 the very poor have
times more likely to be been spatially
• Climate change
concentrated in high- isolated from
poverty opportunity:
neighborhoods than • Jim Crow, • the Credit and
poor whites. Foreclosure
• ghettos,
crisis
• In 2000, they were 7.3 • barrios, etc.
times more
likely.
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11. Different communities are situated differently with respect
to institutions and opportunity.
Community A has Community B has Community C has
no insurance and no insurance, but access to both
no hospitals in there’s a hospital insurance an a
the area. down the street. hospital.
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12. Problem: 3 people are out
to sea and a big storm is
coming
Goal: To reach the people
within 6 hours
Assumption: If we can
reach them within 6 hours,
we will save them all.
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13. But the 3 are not all in the stormy water
in the same way…
Which person would be most likely to
survive the 6 hours it would take to
reach them??
If water is a “structure,”(housing,
education, etc.) some groups are able to
navigate the structure more successfully
than other groups.
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14. Example: Controlling for risk factors, African Americans
were 15-30% more likely than whites to get subprime loans for
purchase and for refinance
Likely refinance targets: elderly, often widowed, African
American women in urban areas
For Latinos, similar numbers for purchase, not for refinance
Many Latino homebuyers were recent, first generation
homebuyers who could not be automatically underwritten
(multiple income earners, cash, local credit, etc.)
Sources: Graciela Aponte (National Council of La Raza) and Debbie Bocian (Center for Responsible Lending) presentations
at The Economic Policy Institute panel “Race, Ethnicity and the Subprime Mortgage Crisis” on June 12, 2008 in WDC; and 14
“Baltimore Finds Subprime Crisis Snags Women” in The New York Times online, Jan. 15, 2008
15. • “If they wanted to, they could pull
Is it culture? themselves up by their bootstraps.”
Is it interpersonal • “If only people would stop
racism? stereotyping and discriminating….”
• “Institutions can interact in ways
Is it structural? that are discriminatory.”
Is it some or all of the above?
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16. A series of mutually reinforcing federal policies across multiple
domains have contributed to the disparities we see today.
School Desegregation
Suburbanization/ Homeownership
Urban Renewal
Public Housing
Transportation
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17. Structures and policies
School
are not neutral. They Lower
Segregation &
Educational
unevenly distribute Concentrated
Outcomes
benefits and burdens. Poverty
Institutions can operate
jointly to produce
racialized outcomes. Racial and Increased
Economic Flight
Neighborhood of Affluent
Segregation Families
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18. Example: A bird in a cage
Examining one wire cannot
explain why a bird cannot fly.
But multiple wires, arranged
in specific ways, reinforce each
other and trap the bird.
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19. Structural Barriers
Some people ride the “Up” Others have to run up
escalator to reach the “Down” escalator to
opportunity. get there.
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20. One Dimensional:
One variable explains
differential outcomes
Multidimensional:
The individual bars working
together to cage the bird
… to an understanding of
processes and relationships
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21. We need to think about the ways in which the institutions that
mediate opportunity are arranged – systems thinking.
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22. Our relationship to these systems and the responsiveness of
systems is both uneven and racialized.
While understanding the relationships that exist within a system
is important, we need to look for nodes of influence and power.
Where are the levers that can enact
change?
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23. Our perceptions of race are shaped
by our subconscious attitudes and by
how messages are framed.
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24. The racial categories into which we group people are not as
problematic as the social meaning and racial hierarchy we
assign to those groups.
People talk about race as though it is essential. This provokes
some important questions:
How is race constructed?
By whom?
For what purpose?
What work does it do?
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25. The fact that race is constructed implies that it has a history
and that it is constantly changing.
People tend to misunderstand and underestimate the
significance of this.
How does our perception of race change?
What forces are causing these changes?
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26. Racial attitudes in the U.S. have improved significantly over time.
We have moved from segregation into a period of racial egalitarianism.
Interracial relationships are becoming more accepted.
We elected a biracial President.
The United States continues to be strongly divided by race.
Nationally, the black unemployment rate tends to be about twice as high
as the white rate.
A black male born in 2001 has a 32% chance of spending time in prison at
some point in his life, a Hispanic male has a 17% chance, and a white
male has a 6% chance.
http://www.sentencingproject.org/doc/pu
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blications/rd_reducingracialdisparity.pdf
27. Both these perspectives are true – how we frame issues of race
matters.
Consider the false dichotomies we often use when we think and
talk about race. These binaries are actually frames.
Black / White
Post-racialism / Civil Rights
Race is not important / Race matters
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29. Implicit Bias
• People are meaning-making
machines.
•Individual meaning
•Collective meaning
•Only 2% of emotional cognition is
available to us consciously
We unconsciously
think about race • Racial bias tends to reside in the
even when we do
not explicitly
unconscious network
discuss it.
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32. Distributions of Responses on Explicit
(Self-reported) and Implicit Measures
Groups Explicit Implicit
Compared
Nonwhite Neutral White Nonwhite Neutral White
Blacks/Whites 12% 56% 32% 12% 19% 69%
Asians/Whites 16% 57% 27% 11% 26% 63%
Note: Percentages represent the percent biased in favor of group.
Source: 94 California Law Review (2006), p. 957. 32
35. Are you right-brained or left-brained?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkJVqhEcHiY&feature=related
OR
http://www.moillusions.com/2007/06/spinning-sihouette-optical-
illusion.html
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37. Indoors.
Outside
There is a
under a tree.
window
The woman
through which
has an item
shrubbery
balanced on
outside can
her head.
be seen.
Your response is indicative of your cultural orientation.
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38. Repeatedly exposing people to admired African Americans can
may help counteract pro-white / anti-black IAT results…
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39. BUT, a more productive strategy is to show both admired African
Americans and infamous whites.
Joy-Gaba, J . A., & Nosek, B. A. (in press). The Surprisingly Limited
Malleability of Implicit Racial Evaluations. Social Psychology. 39
41. 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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43. Maps can visually track the
history and presence of
discriminatory and exclusionary
policies that spatially segregate
people.
Identifying places with gaps in
opportunity can help direct
future investment.
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45. Adopt strategies that open up access to levers of opportunity for
marginalized individuals, families, and communities
Connect people to existing opportunities throughout the
metropolitan region
Bring opportunities to opportunity-deprived areas
Invest in people, places, and linkages
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47. Advocate for an opportunity-based approach to community
development and housing advocacy
Support both in-place and mobility-based strategies to
affirmatively provide access to opportunity
Adopt a multi-disciplinary, collaborative approach to advocacy
Design strategies that are sensitive to the unique challenges
and strategic opportunities of each community
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Graphic: sxc.hu; shlomaster
50. We usually focus on how spirituality inspires social justice work,
but not on how working for social justice informs spirituality.
Caring about other’s suffering is not just about relieving their
suffering but about one’s own spiritual development.
Social
Spirituality
Justice
51. Our values and
structures impact
each other.
It’s not enough to
have the right
values. We need
the right structures.
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52. 1. The inherent worth and dignity of every person;
2. Justice, equity and compassion in human relations;
3. Acceptance of one another and encouragement to spiritual
growth in our congregations;
4. A free and responsible search for truth and meaning;
5. The right of conscience and the use of the democratic process
within our congregations and in society at large;
6. The goal of world community with peace, liberty, and justice
for all;
7. Respect for the interdependent web of all existence of which
we are a part.
http://www.uua.org/visitors/6798.shtml 52
53. “We started the journey, a spiritual one, to be
truly ‘whole,’ to accept, respect, value each
person while responding to his/her behaviour
on its own merits. Then we worked to change
our own church institution, and finally started
on all of those of American society. Sorry, we
still have a long way to go. And this is where
you must carry on!”
~ Tomas Firle, member, First Unitarian
Universalist Church of San Diego, CA
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p. 586, The Arc of the Universe is Long
56. Current paradigm: Hobbesian, isolated
Perceives individuals as autonomous-independent selves
Egoistic, possessive, separate, isolated, rational
This has led to increasing hyper-individualism and fear of the other
This framework creates and marginalizes the racialized other
Racial disparities are seen as a subjective, personal experience
Creates false separations – negates shared humanity
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57. What is the alternative vision?
A model of connectedness
Individuals as part of something bigger
Inter-being, unified, not egoistically separate
Individualism and interconnectivity are not mutually excusive
When linked correctly, interconnectivity supports individuality
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