7.03 Racism as Structural Institutional

Racism as Structural/Institutional

Disproportionate Discrimination

• Students of color, indigenous students, low-income students, women, and other marginalized groups experience significant discrimination and systemic oppression in educational settings and beyond. This discrimination can manifest in various forms, including biased disciplinary actions, limited access to advanced coursework, and fewer educational resources.

• Winant (2002) highlights a global correlation where wealth and well-being are predominantly associated with white skin and European descent, while poverty aligns with darker skin and "otherness." This systemic inequality often leaves marginalized groups grappling with obstacles that their white peers do not face, ultimately restricting their academic and socioeconomic mobility.

• While there are exceptional individuals from these marginalized communities who achieve success, they remain outliers in the overall trend which consistently shows the relationship between race and socioeconomic status, highlighting the entrenched nature of these disparities.

Possessive Investment in Whiteness (PIW)

• Coined by George Lipsitz in the 1990s, the concept of PIW explains how white people benefit from promoting and maintaining structural advantages that favor white communities, creating a societal framework where whiteness is seen as the norm.

• This investment encourages the normalization of whiteness as a standard, which in turn maintains societal structures that build figurative and literal walls to access resources, opportunities, and the accumulation of wealth—exacerbating inequalities.

Example: Redlining

• Redlining is a discriminatory practice where communities predominantly occupied by people of color are marked as inferior in terms of credit rating, resulting in discriminatory housing policies. These policies diminish access to wealth accumulation through homeownership, restricting opportunities for financial growth and community investment that primarily benefit white neighborhoods.

Structural vs. Institutional Racism

• Structural Racism: Encompasses larger societal patterns that influence individual and collective disadvantages across multiple domains—healthcare, education, employment, and housing. Structural racism is often ingrained in the culture and social systems of a society, making it difficult to identify and challenge directly.

• Institutional Racism: Examines specific laws and policies that systematically create inequalities. Educational and housing systems that privilege whites over people of color exemplify institutional racism, manifesting in practices such as standardized testing biases, funding disparities, and exclusionary zoning laws.

Equality vs. Equity

• Equality: Refers to the idea that all individuals have the same access and rights to resources, which assumes a level playing field despite differing starting positions.

• Equity: Recognizes that different groups have diverse starting positions and, therefore, may require tailored resources and targeted interventions to achieve fair outcomes. Equity aims to address systemic barriers to provide everyone a legitimate opportunity to succeed.

The Impact of Historical Context

• Legacy of Slavery: The institution of slavery established an enduring socio-economic hierarchy that embedded racial inequalities into society. This legacy continues to affect perceptions of Black people today, often associating them with criminality or undesirable traits. The long-term lack of access to generational wealth and privileges allotted to whites perpetuates disparities influenced by historical injustices.

Effects of Possessive Investment in Whiteness

• Colorblindness and its Consequences: Colorblind racism allows white individuals to ignore the significance of race and its impact, thereby preserving systemic white superiority. This pervasive mindset undermines efforts to address racial inequalities, framing them as nonexistent and allowing oppressive structures to persist.

• Historical moments, such as the Supreme Court cases—Bhagat Singh Thind (1923) and Takao Ozawa (1922)—illustrate attempts made by racial minorities to claim whiteness based on societal definitions that ultimately reasserted racial hierarchies.

The Three I’s of Oppression

• Institutional Oppression: Occurs within societal institutions (e.g., government, education) through laws, regulations, and policies that disadvantage certain groups. For instance, the Immigration Act of 1924 established quotas that negatively impacted non-white immigrants, reinforcing discrimination and systemic inequalities.

• Interpersonal Oppression: Represents direct interactions where individuals inflict harm on one another. This can take the form of name-calling, microaggressions, or exclusion based on race, illustrating the individual-level aspects of systemic racism.

• Internalized Oppression: Refers to how individuals from marginalized groups internalize negative societal messages about their race or identity, affecting their self-worth and perceptions. The phenomenon of colonial mentality highlights how colonized communities may accept superiority norms established by colonizers, leading to self-devaluation and perpetuation of oppressive attitudes within their populations.

Educational Implications

• The model of "Structures of Dominance" suggests that educational policies and practices significantly shape interactions within academic environments, influencing both how educators and students perceive themselves and one another. Understanding these dynamics is essential for creating inclusive educational settings that counteract existing power imbalances.

Ideology and Hegemony

• Ideology refers to a set of beliefs that define and delineate societies, often reinforcing the values of dominant groups while marginalizing others, such as prevailing beauty standards that favor whiteness.

• Hegemony, a concept developed by Antonio Gramsci, denotes the dominance of particular beliefs over others, establishing cultural norms that normalize the status quo and perpetuate existing power structures. This cultural dominance suppresses resistance and reinforces systemic inequalities within society.