Treatment and experiences of racism
Racism and racist treatment are central to how respondents perceive and experience mainstream civil society. A key finding of the survey is that
77% of respondents have experienced or witnessed racism in the last five years
The most frequently mentioned form of racism was ignorant and insensitive questioning about culture or religion, followed by being treated as an intellectual inferior and then by being harshly scrutinised by colleagues, including being given unfair performance assessments.
Ignorance and insensitivity can be more than clumsiness. It can be wilful and undermining, as in the case of one respondent who noted having experienced a senior colleague
constantly referring to my intersectionality groups of ethnicity and religion as saying ‘Your lot’.
Another participant shared how as a matter of course, they are assumed to be less skilled and experienced then they in fact are:
People that have no close knowledge of my work quality or expertise instinctively treating me more junior than I am, and questioning me in a way they don’t question my peers.
It is noteworthy that respondents most often named senior staff, including directors and managers, as the group who have played a significant role in acts of racism they have experienced, rather than more junior staff. For example, one survey participant said:
The origin of the racist disrespect, exclusion and scrutiny was always senior management peers or chief executive level. Eventually, more public humiliations or briefing against me led to my own direct reports knowing they could undermine and bypass me.
In this example, treatment by senior staff undermined the respondent’s position in the organisation. This is a reminder that although the sharp end of racism may involve an issue between individuals, when senior staff take racist action or fail to act against racism, it becomes an institution-wide problem.
Counterintuitively, the imperative for greater ethnic diversity can also lead to hostile treatment of Black or Minoritised Ethnic (BME) people within civil society – again perhaps especially by senior staff. One survey contributor described how they were over-scrutinised when they were promoted into a management-level job.
I was infantilised in my management post. After expressing I wanted to return to my former officer role, I was offered support but I believe this was more to save face since many BME colleagues had left in recent months.
In this example, the respondent was suffocated in their new role, but the optics of another Black and Minoritised Ethnic person leaving led the organisation to try to keep them in post.
This case shows how
greater diversity alone does not solve a problem of racism. Doing that requires commitment to inclusivity, anti-racism and race equity. Without such commitments, diversity drives may simply put Black or Minoritised Ethnic people into harmful situations.
The treatment experienced by respondents also demonstrated that racist action can make Black and Minoritised Ethnic people in civil society both hyper-visible and subject to great scrutiny on the one hand, and invisible on the other.
The quote above about being infantilised in a management role illustrates excess scrutiny. But in other examples when a Black or Minoritised Ethnic person excels, this can be simply overlooked. For example, one contributor described:
being listened to when giving a recommendation (then completely ignoring it) only for the recommendation to be universally acknowledged upon a white counterpart saying the same thing ten minutes later.
Hyper-visibility and invisibility appear to be twin sides of racist practice in mainstream civil society organisations. This can make Black and Minoritised Ethnic people in some organisations feel like they do not belong and that they are being set up to fail.
As a result of these experiences in and understandings of mainstream civil society, 50%[1] of respondents feel that their ‘race’ or ethnicity has counted against them in mainstream civil society. And a further
73% of respondents agree that mainstream civil society has a racism problem.[2]
[1] 55 of 110 responses to the question.
[2] 83 of 114 responses to the question.
