Policy-based recommendations for advancing racial equity.
Public awareness of systemic inequality and structural racism appears to be at or near its historical peak, especially among white Americans. As a result, not only do we see a virulent backlash from entrenched conservatives, but—the good news—possibilities exist for real policy change to be enacted for the first time in decades.
Many organizations and institutions, including the Asheville Buncombe Reparations Commission, are working to develop potential solutions to overcome structural racism. The University of California, Berkeley has compiled scores of ideas from numerous sources at its “Structural Racism Remedies Repository” (belonging.berkeley.edu/structural-racism-remedies-repository).
The Berkeley project is the first comprehensive effort to organize and summarize existing literature on remedies for systemic and structural racism, designed to share ideas for future policy discussions, identify current trends, and note areas of consensus (and disagreement) growing out of these disparate efforts.
The repository will continue to grow as change agents continue their work; but all the sources in the repository share two common aims: remedying—and ultimately eliminating—structural and systemic racism, and advancing racial equity. The ideas found there include process-based recommendations, ideas for new programs or initiatives, and calls for reforms to existing policies or programs.
Whether the types of reforms and policy changes that the Berkeley project compiles will successfully redress systemic racism or reduce extreme racial disparities is an open question, but it is clearly one that urgently needs addressing. Those actively engaged in the movement for change—whether eliminating racism or establishing true reparations—are encouraged to add their ideas and recommendations, as well as concrete steps they are taking—by sharing them with [email protected]
Access the Structural Racism…
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