Concluding Comments: Racial Vilification Panel
Emeritus
Professor Laksiri Jayasuriya AM
The
occasion of this National Conference affords us an opportunity to reflect
on how we as a nation have handled this complex topic of racism which
has been a running sore in the body politic for a long time. Racial
vilification, that aspect of racism we have considered this afternoon,
compels us to consider the harm inflicted on individuals and society
as a whole by the dehumanisation of particular groups. In attempting
to secure some degree of security and protection of one's dignity, one
response has been through legal protection but as we have heard, there
are other ways of regulating hate speech and other expressions of racial
vilification.
Perhaps
it is worth recalling that racism entered the Australian public consciousness
only as recently as the early 1970s. A notable landmark document in
this regard is the three volume study of Australian racism, edited by
Frank Stevens, Racism: The Australian Experience. This was a
major turning point in generating an increased awareness of the nature
of racism and developing a scholarly understanding of racism. Regrettably,
over nearly 3 decades we have made little progress. The Australian literature
on racism remains scanty and fragmented, leading to a diminished understanding
of racism. In this context, the Review of the RDA Act of 1995 undertaken
by HREOC, though dealing with anti discrimination legislation, stadns
out as an extremely valuable resource documenting critical issues relating
to racism as an aspect of Australian public policy.
In
this volume Margaret Thornton and Sarah Pritchard make pointed reference
to the paucity of thinking about race and racism in Australia. They
make special reference to the absence of theorizing along the lines
of critical race theory which has had a notable influence on thinking
about race and racism in the United States and elsewhere. What Thornton
and Pritchard have brought to the fore is that racism is not just a
matter of 'individual prejudice in everyday practice'. It is a phenomenon
deeply embedded in language and perception as 'an inseparable and ubiquitous
'feature of modern society which functions and reveals itself 'despite
official rhetoric' to the contrary.
The
official rhetoric in Australia as in other western democracies stipulates
that racism is officially and culturally condemned and espouses the
ideological democratic values of tolerance and equality. No wonder,
Heider in Austria, and Pauline Hanson do not concede that their political
platforms and political agenda are racist in character. As a result
of racism being officially sanctioned as socially unacceptable, what
we have is a denial of racism. This denial goes along with a taboo and
'silence' on racism, and so much so that being 'politically correct'
is to be un-Australian.
This denial of racism, characteristic of the Establishment, is, I
believe, one of the distinctive characteristics of Australian racism
and one which has seriously impaired any efforts to deal with racism
as an aspect of public policy. Clearly, the acknowledgement of racism
- the willingness to put it on the political agenda and confront it
honestly is a prerequisite for overcoming racism. Of course, this in
itself affords no guarantee in combatting racism, but is certainly an
important first step.
In
addition, there is an urgent need is to generate a better understanding
of Australian race and racism so that we may draw on contemporary theorising
such as critical race theory and other studies in developing an Australian
perspective on race and racism. To this end, we may start by looking
at the experience of countries such as Canada and the UK in dealing
with racism. For example, the recent outburst of British Parliamentarian
Norman Tebbit, praising the Home Secretary, David Plunket, for his new
White Paper on Immigration, has an undeniable resonance for us in Australia.
Indeed, there is much to be gained by considering the experience of
British racism, and we do have many Tebbits and Plunkets in Australia!
According to many commentators, Plunket's White Paper is in effect,
returning Britain to an outmoded monocultural assimilationistic (recommending
preferred marriage partner for new migrants love by legislation). This,
it is argued, is a retrograde step putting back race relations theorising
since the landmark MacPherson Report of 1999, which covered new ground
in ways of confronting racism.
Sadly,
we in Australia have nothing to equal the insights and new thinking
about racism which emerged from this watershed Report. The MacPherson
Report deviated markedly from earlier thinking, going back to the Scarman
Report which regarded race relations as a matter of interpersonal relations.
Thus, when we deal with racial vilification as abuse, denigration, or
threats of harm and seek legal remedies, the underlying assumption is
that we are dealing with individual acts of behaviour or forms of direct
discrimination. This mode of thinking about racism and combatting racism
typifies what goes as individual racism, and has been characteristic
of much of the Australian experience in dealing with racism. Australian
race relations has tended to be seen largely as having to do with personal
relations, and often as a pathological aspect of human behaviour.
The
MacPherson Report was highly significant because it went against the
orthodoxy of race relations based on individual racism and broke with
cultural and individual explanations of racism. Instead, MacPherson
highlighted the importance of institutional racism - or racism as an
indirect or systemic discrimination which arises from the structures,
policies and practices of institutions - the culture of organizations
such as the Police or the Judicary.
Confronted
with this recognition of institutional racism, some sought to salvage
the orthodoxy of race relations theorising by endeavouring to reduce
institutional racism to a matter of individual racism by reworking racism
as prejudice plus power. Hence, the suggestion that what we should do
in combating racism is to alter distribution of power within institutions
and organizations. This has led, in some quarters to seek changes to
positions of power by giving organizations greater representation of
persons drawn from victimized groups. For example, we now have demands
for more Aboriginal or Asian people in the police. But as one critic
has rightly observed, changing the colour of the incumbent does not
necessarily change the colour of the policy.
What
this suggests is that 'race' and racism, as an ideology - a way of thinking
which is socially constructed - is multi faceted, dynamic, and constantly
changing. Contemporary studies of racism have shown that there are many
forms of racism and different expressions of racism. Hence, if there
are different kinds of racism, these require different kinds of social
interventions.
This
new thinking suggesting a multidimensional cultural view has been succinctly
summarised in a a Special Report in the Journal, Race and Class Vol 3 (2) by pointing to 'the three faces of British racism'. These theorists
argue that the taxonomy of racism should include Xeno Racism, in addition
to the classic phenomenon of Individual Racism and Institutional
Racism. Xeno racism comes from xenophobia understood as the
'fear of strangers' and emotionally charged as a passionate defence
of 'our way of life' - a strident nationalism which breeds exclusion
on various grounds. As the outstanding UK race theorist Sivanandan put
it, this xeno racism is xenophobic in form but in substance it is unadulterated
racism in that it reifies people, denigrates and excludes. To quote
one writer, 'the asylum seeker issue has been an open wound through
which racism has reinfected the body politic, combining and reinforcing
other forms of popular racism such as new racism.
The
new language of discourse demonizing 'refugees' and asylum seekers as
'illegal immigrants' threatening national security has created a new
dimension to racism. What is important about xeno-racism is that it
is a form of state racism where the state has intervened with its full
force calling on all its structures, institutions, and bureaucracy to
combat the threat to the security of the state. In combatting this form
of xeno-racism, we have to combat state racism, manifest in asylum laws,
mandatory detention, deaths n custody and so on.
The
point I wish to make, by drawing attention to these overseas experiences
and new theorising about racism to indicate just how far behind we are
in thinking about racism and strategies for comabtting racism. Stated
bluntly, for a variety of reasons, but primarily because of a lack of
political leadership, we in Australia have not had the political will
or the ability to 'engage in a national conversation about how to tackle
racism' afflicting the institutions of society and all aspects of private,
public popular culture. Over the last 3 decades, since the passage of
RD Act in 1975, we have been complacent with a strategic denial of racism
and content with symbolic policies exemplified in generating new statutes
with hardly any resources or structures for the implementation of legislative
measures.
Let
me conclude by commending to you an example of a public policy approach
to Racism in Canada, which is worthwhile emulating. I refer to the establishment
of the Canadian Race Relations Foundation in 1996, a Centre of Excellence
on Race Relations. This was to be an independent structure - at arm's
length from government - with a mandate to be a clearing house on racism,
a source of knowledge and information for the public and a resource
development. It is significant that this body was conceived as an important
instrument of Canadian multiculturalism. The Canadian government committed
initially a sum of nearly $25 million. I hope those interested will
go the website of this body to get more information. (crr.ca/English).
The
recent policy of all Australian Governments stands in marked contrast
to that of countries like Canada and the UK. Our stance is best described
as 'doing good by doing little'. Hopefully, one outcome of this important
Conference will be to generate and fortify a new awareness and consciousness
that will enable us to expose the falsity and dishonesty of the distorted
logic and rationale of all forms of racism - individual, institutional
and xenophobic.
