Joanna Williams’ report for Civitas asks whether contemporary anti-racist programmes being adopted and implemented in Britain’s public institutions and private organisations do much to improve the lives of ethnic minorities. Do they end systemic racism, or do they reintroduce racial thinking that reduces and simplifies human lives and experience?
By almost all statistical measures, Joanna Williams argues, society is less racist today than at any other point in the past century – a point which is rarely celebrated. Still less is this considered a reason to leave people to negotiate inter-cultural and inter-racial relationships for themselves. Despite there being less racism today, the message from the media, best-selling books, diversity workshops held in schools, universities and the workplace, is that not being racist is no longer sufficient: we must all be actively anti-racist and demonstrate our anti-racism in ways approved by a cohort of race experts.