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Preface
Tis is the Fourth Edition of Race and Racism in Britain. It comes out at a time when the key issues that it discusses are the focus of extensive political debate as well as everyday conversations in the wider civil society. Like the previous three editions, it aims to provide readers with an up-to-date overview of contemporary scholarship, research, and policy debates about the changing contours of race and racism in British society, focusing particularly on the second half of the twentieth century and the frst three decades of the twenty-frst century. To achieve this objective, we have substantially reworked the book as a whole and each chapter to take account of new scholarship and research to take more fully into account the key developments that have come to the fore over the past three decades. We have also engaged fully with the new theoretical and conceptual debates that have helped to transform the study of racial and ethnic relations over the past few decades. At the same time, we have aimed to hold on to the objective that led us to produce the frst edition over three decades ago, namely, to provide an accessible resource for both students and lecturers who are curious about the origins and trajectory of political and policy debates in this fast-changing area. Although much has changed in the decades that have followed there remains a noticeable need for a book such as this that aims to provide an overview of the changing role of race and racism in British society. It is with this overarching objective in mind that we have produced this new edition in the hope that it will meet the needs of current and future cohorts of students who are curious about both the origins of the present situation and want to explore key areas of political and policy debate. Te continuing relevance of the key issues that are the focus of this book has been highlighted over the past few decades by the experience of ongoing debates about racialisation and national identity, about urban unrest and
protest, controversies about immigration and refugees, the public furore about the Windrush Generation, intense political debates about Brexit, public conversations about the extent of racialised inequalities in British society, the continuing conversation about the Grenfell Tower fre, and by the intense debates about Black Lives Matter and the ongoing policy discussions about the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on black and ethnic minority workers and communities. Although these issues may seem unconnected on the surface it is also important, as we suggest in this book, to remain curious about the links between them. As you go through the substantive chapters of this book, we hope that you can explore whether there are any links between them, and that you can explore the complexities of the contemporary racialised politics in British society.
It is also evident that the role of race and racism as an important factor in contemporary social and political issues is now widely recognised in a broad range of societies beyond Britain, as has been made clear by ongoing public debates about racism and racial divisions across the globe, the mobilisations about Black Lives Matter, and related issues. It is therefore important to remember that when we study these issues in relation to British society, we are also inevitably looking at phenomena that have a global reach and that it is important therefore to avoid the tendency to see our national story as somehow unique. Rather, as we argue throughout this book, the issues that we are addressing are part of social and political relations that have an impact in various geopolitical contexts. We cannot explore these connections in any detail in this book, but as you go through the various chapters, you will see some discussion of the ways in which our experience in Britain connects with other national narratives or in some cases is marked by the historical and contemporary trajectories that have helped to make ideas and values around racial and ethnic relations take specifc forms in our society.
While for some commentators there was hope that the twenty-frst century would see the realisation of a post-racial future, underpinned by antiracist values and political commitments to racial equality and multiculturalism, the reality seems to be that we are some way short from this social transformation. Indeed, in the contemporary environment, questions about race and racism remain deeply contested in many societies across the globe and are often the site of intense controversy and confict both at the scale of national politics and in more localised and varied environments (Back and Solomos 2022; Solomos 2020). Indeed, it seems clear that the questions that we address in this book are likely to remain at the heart of political debates and ongoing conversations in civil society over the coming period.
In the British context, this was highlighted by the public furore that accompanied the publication in 2021 of the report of the Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities (Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities 2021). Although the Commission concluded that there was no evidence of embedded institutionalised racism in British society a wide range of responses both by academics and other commentators questioned both the evidence base for such a conclusion and its policy consequences. Te public conversations that followed the publication of the Commission’s report have once again highlighted the need for reasoned and research-based discussion about the role of race and racism in contemporary British society, and we hope that the publication of this new edition will contribute to these ongoing conversations. Te response of the Conservative government to these conversations has been to ignore criticisms and to pursue a strategy that emphasises a strategy to develop an inclusive Britain while at the same time pursuing an exclusionary approach to undesirable migrants and refugees (Badenoch 2021; Minister of State for Equalities 2022). We shall return to these ongoing debates about the future at several points later in the book as we engage with the evolution of political and policy agendas.
So, the process of putting this new edition of Race and Racism in Britain together has been framed in many ways by the need to address both the question of how we have arrived at the present situation and to explore avenues for change and transformation that are being discussed in the present and that may be possible in the future. Given the live nature of the key areas that it covers, it is also a book that aims to give readers an insight into the social and political processes, struggles and controversies, and policy choices that have shaped both the policy and political agendas of the second half of the twentieth century and initial decades of the twenty-frst century. Although there are some accounts that seek to cover some facets of the issues that we focus on in this book there is still a need for an account such as this one that seeks to provide an overarching analysis of the development of public debates and policies about immigration, race, and racism over the past few decades. Other accounts have a somewhat narrower focus and do not cover both the range of issues that we seek to engage with in this book or the detailed explorations of specifc arenas of political and policy debate (Dorling and Tomlinson 2019; Hampshire 2013; Shilliam 2018).
Writing this Fourth Edition of Race and Racism in Britain has taken some time, but it has been helped along the way by the collegiality and support of both students and colleagues in my various academic Departments and wider academic and institutional networks. First, it is important to acknowledge the encouragement and support of colleagues at the University of Warwick for
providing me with a supportive environment to work on both the First and Fourth Editions. I am also grateful to diferent generations of students at Warwick, where the First Edition of this book was initially started, Birkbeck, Southampton, London South Bank, City University, and Warwick again for engaging with my eforts to teach various courses linked to the contents of this book. Tis is a tricky time for universities, and departments of sociology, and I have been privileged to work with colleagues at all these institutions who have provided the kind of collegial environment that has given me space to work on my research alongside teaching and administrative commitments. I have also been lucky enough to work in universities that have a strong commitment to teaching, research and scholarship and that have given me both the opportunity to teach interesting students and the intellectual and research support to work on the ideas that fnd expression in this book. Colleagues and students at Warwick have provided me with a vibrant and engaging working environment during the fnal stages of working on this edition of the book. Tis is also a book that is very much the product of my eforts over the years to teach courses on the sociology and politics of race and immigration. Te contents of all the editions of this book have been framed by my engagement with various cohorts of students who have challenged me to provide an overview of the role of race and racism in British society. Many of these students have provided me with the opportunity to discuss with them ideas and issues that I found interesting and have encouraged me by their responses to follow my curiosity and explore how best to understand the key dimensions of race and racism in British society as they have evolved and changed over the past few decades. Te various groups of students that have taken my courses have also helped me understand that it is important to engage the sociological imagination to make teaching a process of learning and developing more critical understandings of both the past and the present. Trough their varied responses, they have also reminded me that teaching is very much about broadening the minds of both students and lecturers and being open to the idea that sometimes we have to say, ‘I don’t know’, and try to do research, refection, and analysis to fnd out answers to questions that are not fully understood. Tis edition is ofered in the hope that it will be of interest to future cohorts of students that are curious about how we have reached the current state of racial relations in our society, and who wish to explore the historical and contemporary processes that have helped to shape the present. Rather than ofer you a singular explanation of the evolution of race and racism in British society, we hope the book gives you some ideas for refection, makes you curious to explore some issues further, and provides you with some tools for critical refection. Tis is an interesting time to be studying questions
about racial and ethnic relations in British society and I hope this new edition provides you with some of the tools that you need in order to make sense of the contemporary conjuncture and how we have arrived at the current settlement.
More generally, I would like to acknowledge the support of a wide range of my network of academic colleagues, including Claire Alexander, Les Back, Leah Bassel, Alice Bloch, Manuela Bojadzijev, Martin Bulmer, Patricia Hill Collins, Adrian Favell, Paul Gilroy, Michael Hanchard, Michael Keith, Tony Kushner, Marco Martiniello, Karim Murji, Yasmeen Narayan, Sarah Neal, Terese O’Toole, Liza Schuster, Miri Song, and Satnam Virdee. Given the pressures that exist in academic life, I am grateful to all of them for taking time to talk to me and more generally to share their ideas about issues covered in this book. My own teachers at Kennington Secondary Modern in South London, particularly Mr Patel and Mr Hussey, inspired me to read and broaden my knowledge and I am forever grateful for that. Tey guided me to think about going to university at a time when I knew nothing about higher education. Teir quiet support and belief in me helped to instil in me values that I hope remain with me today, and it is a regret I never said a proper thank you to them both.
In addition, I would like to thank my publishers at Palgrave Macmillan, including Steven Kennedy, Sharla Plant, Liam Inscoe-Jones, and Sarah Hills for their guidance, patience, and support in preparing this edition. Steven discussed with me my early ideas for the First Edition and helped me understand the process of writing a book that will engage both students and informed readers. His wise advice also helped to improve the book at various stages of its development through the Second and Tird Editions. Sharla, Liam, and Sarah have been very helpful in developing the Fourth Edition and seeing it through the fnal stages.
As ever Christine, Nikolas, and Daniel have indulged me many hours upstairs in the study listening to music and writing. My parents, Kyriacou and Nikolas, and my grandparents, Cleopatra, Yiannis, Solomos, and Styliani, experienced a harsher life world than me, but I am grateful for all the love they showed against the odds. Tey grew up in an environment I could never even imagine, but they were always there to support, encourage, and sustain us through their belief in the value of education. I am forever grateful my parents made the difcult and brave decision to leave their home and bring us to a new life, and new opportunities, in the London of the 1960s as economic migrants. Tis provided us with opportunities for education and mobility that we could have not even imagined when we arrived in London to a world far removed from our small village, Voroklini, in Cyprus.
I have been sustained through the writing process by my passion for West Bromwich Albion and the group of friends from the London Baggies who have been there when we followed our team up and down the country, and up and down the Premier League and the Championship. More recently my walks through my local neighbourhoods in North London have given me the space to think and rework my ideas. Te wonders of Alexandra Palace, Parkland Walk, Queen’s Wood, Highgate Wood, and Hampstead Heath helped to push me along in the fnal stages of working on this book. I should also mention the wonders of the Spotify algorithm in keeping me supplied with wonderful music from all over the world for my walks.
In ofering this Fourth Edition to the diverse readership that will no doubt use it, I very much look forward to hearing the responses of both students and lecturers who use this edition as part of their teaching. Te previous three editions have, I know, from talking to various generations of students and lecturers, been widely used on modules concerned with race relations in British society. I very much hope that a large proportion of the audience of this edition will be new generations of students taking courses on the evolving forms of race and racism in British society. If you would like to share some of your thoughts about this edition with me, please feel free to let me know what you think of the book, or specifc chapters, and any suggestions you may have about it more generally.
Coventry, UK
References
John Solomos
Back, Les, and Solomos, John, eds. (2022). Teories of Race and Racism: A Reader, 3rf ed. London: Routledge.
Badenoch, Kemi. (2021). Minister for Equalities’ Speech on the Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities’ Report, April 26. https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/ minister- for- equalities- speech- on- the- commission- on- race- and- ethnicdisparities-report.
Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities. (2021). Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities: Te Report. London: Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities. Dorling, Daniel, and Tomlinson, Sally. (2019). Rule Britannia: Brexit and the End of Empire. London: Biteback Publishing.
Hampshire, James. (2013). Te Politics of Immigration: Contradictions of the Liberal State. Cambridge: Polity.
Minister of State for Equalities. (2022). Inclusive Britain: Government Response to the Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities. London: HMSO.
Shilliam, Robbie. (2018). Race and the Undeserving Poor: From Abolition to Brexit. London: Agenda.
Solomos, John, ed. (2020). Routledge International Handbook of Contemporary Racisms. Abingdon: Routledge.
List of Tables
Table 3.1 Immigration Legislation before 1945
Table 4.1 Immigration Legislation: 1962–1996
Table 5.1 Immigration legislation 1997–2021 120
Table 6.1 Race Relations Legislation from 1965
1
Introduction
Te First Edition of Race and Racism in Britain was published in 1989, and it was followed by the Second and Tird Editions in 1993 and 2003 (Solomos 1989, 1993, 2003). At the time when the First Edition came out, the study of race, racism, and ethnic relations, in Britain at least, was at a very diferent stage of its formation and evolution. Looking back at that period from the perspective of today it is perhaps surprising that there was a relative dearth of books that sought to provide an overview of the evolving role of race and racism in British society. After all, in the period from the 1960s onwards questions, about race and immigration came to occupy an important role in both national public policy debates and in the context of local political cultures and communities. Tere were some important studies that analysed the changing political and social debates about race and racism (Layton-Henry and Rich 1986; Miles and Phizacklea 1979; Rex and Tomlinson 1979; Saggar 1991, 1992). But it was noticeable that there were few studies, at the time, that sought to provide an overview of race and racism in British society for students who were taking courses in sociology, politics, and related disciplines in the social sciences and humanities. While there were books that explored specifc facets of race relations in British society, or specifc communities and their histories and experiences, there were few texts that covered the range of issues that such courses were addressing. Indeed, there was a noticeable gap in terms of books that provided an overview of the development of political and social responses to race, immigration, and racialisation in British society from the second half of the twentieth century onwards. It is with this gap in mind that we set out to write this book initially. Our overarching aim then was to produce a text that analysed both the
development of the politics of immigration and race relations and the wider sets of political and policy debates that had emerged through the period from the second half of the twentieth century onwards. Our frst thoughts in developing the book grew out of our own experience of teaching courses to both undergraduate and postgraduate students on immigration, race relations, and specifc facets of race and political mobilisation in British society. Te core themes that it covers arose out of this interaction with various groups of students over an extended period. It was this process of engaging with various cohorts of students that highlighted to us the broad areas that needed to be covered in a book such as this, the specifc policy and political arenas that needed to be explored, and the use of case studies that address specifc facets of the evolving situation in British society. Subsequently the publication of the Second and Tird Editions, in 1993 and 2003, and responses to them, signalled the continuing need for a book of this kind that sought to engage students with the analysis of the changing forms of political and civil society debates about race and racism in British society. All editions of the book have come to be used on courses that covered the sociological and political context of race and racism in the context of British society. It has also become evident that the book has been utilised by students and teachers across a range of disciplines, both in the social sciences and the humanities.
Although it is now some time since the Tird Edition of the book was published, we felt that there is still a need for a broad ranging overview of the role of race and racism in British society and therefore we have decided to produce this Fourth Edition, with the aim of enhancing the utility of this book for students who are engaging with courses about race and racism at various stages of their studies. Tis is partly because there are still no easily accessible competitors to the previous edition of this book that can help students engage with an overarching account of the development of racial relations in British society through the period from the second half of the twentieth century and into the present. Little value seems to be placed in the current academic environment on writing student facing texts such as this one, since the writing of theoretical refections or research focused monographs is prioritised by many scholars at the cost of anything that can be seen as a textbook. But it is also because much of the existing work in this broad area remains somewhat narrow in focus and we therefore felt that a new edition of this book would be a valuable addition to the existing scholarship, particularly at a time when there is increasing interest in the changing dynamics of race, ethnicity, and migration in contemporary British society.
In developing this edition, we have done several things that we hope will enhance the value of the book to current students of this ever-changing feld
of scholarship and research. First, we have updated all the chapters to refect both developments in scholarship and research and the wider social, political, and cultural transformations that have taken place in the frst decades of the twenty-frst century. Tis has allowed us to include illustrative examples and themes from the latest scholarship and research. Second, we have also included both historical and more contemporary illustrative examples to bring out the key changes that have helped to shape race relations and expressions of racism in British society, particularly over the past three decades. Finally, we have added or reframed some chapters to balance the range of issues that are covered in the book and to provide an insight into emerging issues and debates. Chapters 5, 9, 11, and 12 add to the substantive issues that are covered by the book and have allowed us to explore issues that lie at the heart of contemporary scholarly and policy debates.
New Agendas and Perspectives
We have also been able to address more fully than in previous editions issues such as the historical background and context of racialisation and immigration, the development of policy agendas about citizenship and immigration, the interrelationship between race, culture and religion, the role of antiimmigrant and extreme-right social movements, changing patterns of racial inequalities, and the political and civil society debates about issues such as Brexit and the Windrush Generation over the past decade. In addition, we have been able to consider new scholarship and research that addresses the core issues that are covered in this book. We have discussed some other key facets of social policies on race in areas not covered in this book in a collaborative study with Alice Bloch and Sarah Neal on Race, Multiculture & Social Policy (Bloch et al. 2013). In that study, we provided detailed discussions of key arenas of racialised forms of social policy, including housing, health, education, and employment, and therefore we have decided not to replicate what is covered in that volume. You may fnd it useful at certain points to look across the two books, since taken together they cover a broader range of policy arenas and the interventions that have helped to shape the experience of race and racism in British society over the past few decades.
In a substantive way, therefore, this is essentially a new book, although the structure of the various chapters remains close to the outline of the previous edition. Rather than simply add to or revise the content of the previous edition, we have focused on framing the analysis of the key issues from the perspective of the key trends in this feld in this early part of the twenty-frst
century. In the aftermath of the growth of research in sociology, politics, geography, and the social sciences more generally on questions about race, racism, and immigration, we have seen a growing body of empirical scholarship on race and ethnic relations and a number of key theoretical texts have been published, particularly over the past few decades (Emirbayer and Desmond 2015; Lentin 2020; Virdee 2014). Tere has also been a noticeable expansion in specialised journals in the feld of racial and ethnic studies and this has resulted in a rapid growth of research-based articles that address key aspects of contemporary racial situations, including research about various facets of contemporary British society. In the past few decades, journals such as Ethnic and Racial Studies, Ethnicities, and Sociology of Race and Ethnicity have established themselves by providing a space to publish the research outputs of the growing number of scholars working on key facets of racial and ethnic relations. In addition, there has been a noticeable growth in the number of research papers published on racial and ethnic issues in more mainstream disciplinary and interdisciplinary journals. Tis process of expansion in scholarly and research agendas has been noticeable in both the context of universities in Britain but also even more so in the context of research and scholarship in the United States, Canada, Europe and globally (Elias and Feagin 2016; Gallagher 2019; Golash-Boza 2016). More generally, it is by now clear that the past few decades have seen a wholesale transformation of the feld of racial and ethnic studies on a global scale, both in terms of new and evolving theoretical paradigms and substantive bodies of empirical research. Tis Fourth Edition, therefore, seeks to analyse the key trends and developments that have helped to shape contemporary political and social debates about race, immigration, and race relations in British society by drawing on the important new bodies of scholarship and research that have emerged over the past few decades. In addition, although this is not a primary concern of this text as such, the frst two chapters provide a synoptic overview of core theoretical debates and historical processes that have helped to shape the present.
More importantly, perhaps, the public debates on race and racism are rather diferent at this point of the twenty-frst century than they were during the period from the 1960s to the 1990s. Perhaps nothing better refects the current phase of public debate in this whole area than the twin preoccupations we see all over Europe, and indeed more globally, with the policy dilemmas raised by new patterns of migration, multiculturalism, religious diversity, and the growing numbers of asylum seekers and refugees. We have seen intense debate on all these questions, as well as related issues such as racism and rightwing political mobilisation, in a variety of societies across Europe as well as in the Americas, Asia, Australasia, and parts of Africa (Alexander 2018;
Craig-Norton et al. 2019; Murji 2017; Redclift 2014). Taken together with the growth of academic research and debate on topics linked to these issues, these developments suggest that we are at the beginning of a new phase in the study of race and racism in Britain and elsewhere. Te likely course of development of this new phase remains to be seen, and there is a degree of uncertainty about how things will play out in practice. But it is already clear that the analytical frames and conversations that were dominant at the end of the twentieth century are no longer adequate as a guide to the likely course of policy and political debate in the current conjuncture. We face new challenges today and it is important to refect on what these are and how societies such as Britain are likely to address them in the coming period.
Tis is particularly important in the context of the important transformations in research agendas that have become evident over the past few decades. From being a relatively neglected feld of research, the study of race and racism is now closer to the heart of contemporary scholarly agendas in a wide range of disciplines (Elias and Feagin 2016; Emirbayer and Desmond 2015). Te proliferation of scholarly texts and journals on various facets of race and ethnicity is symbolic of this broader trend. In general, this development has been positive and is to be welcomed, given the importance of racial ideologies and practices in shaping social relations in several societies. It is worth noting, however, that much of the growing literature in this feld is rather abstracted from the analysis of political, policy, or everyday trends in specifc societies or contexts. A good example of this is the proliferation of theorising that focuses on issues of race and culture, postcolonialism, decolonialism, and critical race theory. As we shall argue later in the book, there is much of value in engaging and thinking through the arguments articulated in these important critical bodies of scholarship, but it is disappointing that few attempts have been made to link theoretical preoccupations to the analysis of social and political trends in British society or in other societies or parts of the globe. Rather, it can be argued that there has been a noticeable retreat from the analysis of the social world and processes of social change into largely conceptual debates about theories that remain abstracted from the everyday realities of the societies in which we live. Tis is by no means a universal trend across all the social sciences and humanities, but part of the challenge we face in the contemporary intellectual environment is how best to bring together conceptual debates and empirically focused research agendas in order to analyse the changing forms of racialised relation in particular societies as well as at a comparative level (Bulmer and Solomos 2018; Collins and Solomos 2010; Hanchard and Chung 2004). More importantly, as we shall argue throughout the book, it is crucial to develop ongoing conversations that can help us to link up diferent
types of research in this feld, whether it be historical scholarship to more detailed ethnographies of local communities or institutional spheres to broader accounts of national and local policy arenas. It is precisely these openended conversations that seem to be largely absent in the contemporary environment.
Key Themes and Objectives
In analysing the developments noted above, we have chosen to remain close to the concerns that have helped to shape the various editions of Race and Racism in Britain, while at the same time focusing the analysis, in the substantive chapters that follow on two key overarching objectives. Our frst objective is to provide an analysis of race and racism in contemporary Britain by focusing on trends and developments from the second half of the twentieth century onwards. Te substantive chapters explore in detail the development of the contemporary social and political debates about race and racism in British society and political responses to black immigration and the growth of multiculturalism. Tis includes an analysis of the pressure for legislative controls and restrictions on immigration, national and local policy developments, policing, and urban unrest, and shifts in racial ideologies that have taken place over the past seventy years or so. In developing this facet of the book, we shall concentrate on developing an account that highlights both key turning points in political and policy debates and the role of legislation that has helped to frame how questions about race, immigration and multiculturalism are understood within British society. Te second objective that informs the book is to encourage readers to explore and analyse key facets of the racialisation of political life and social relations in Britain. Tis is done through an analysis of ideologies that focus on race as an important political symbol and on the part played by racist, antiracist, and ethnic minority political mobilisation, and through an exploration of the impact of social and economic restructuring on racial and national identities in British society and of alternative visions of multiculturalism.
We shall argue that fulflling these objectives requires detailed analysis of both historical and contemporary issues. Tis is refected in the balance of the volume as a whole and in the fact that each chapter includes evidence from a range of disciplines as well as current scholarship and research in sociology and politics. Tis inevitably means crossing disciplinary boundaries as the study of race and ethnicity is by no means limited to one discipline. For example, there has been an impressive growth of interest in these issues by
scholars working in a diverse range of felds and sub-felds in disciplines such as sociology, politics, geography, cultural studies, and history. Consideration of the work of this growing body of scholars, and of others across the social sciences and humanities, allows us to move beyond the narrow disciplinary and conceptual frames of analysis that dominated the study of race and racism until the 1980s and 1990s and to suggest a more interdisciplinary and forward-looking analytical framework. Indeed, it has become evident in the contemporary period that the study of race and racism needs to move beyond its origins and become an increasingly interdisciplinary feld of analysis and research (Crenshaw et al. 2019; Molina et al. 2019; Murji and Solomos 2015).
Taken together the key concerns of Race and Racism in Britain are therefore to guide readers through the complexities of racial formation in British society and to encourage them to think diferently about the history of political and civil society debates about race and racism in the period from the 1940s and 1950s onwards, and into the present. In developing our account, we have been particularly keen to avoid the dangers of seeing the past through the lens of our contemporary situation, or as Michael Banton argued the tendency to reduce the past to the present (Banton 1980). Mindful of this point, an important theme that runs through the book is the need to move beyond the tendency towards presentism by exploring and analysing the complex set of historical and contemporary processes that have shaped the development of racialised politics in British society from the second half of the twentieth century onwards. It is in this spirit that the substantive chapters that follow this one provide an overview of key trends and processes during this period, refect on the part played by specifc issues in shaping racial politics, and explore the changing priorities of public policy, as refected in central and local government interventions. By exploring the changing role of race and racism in shaping contemporary British society and politics, it is hoped that this book will help to shed light on the reasons why we have arrived at our current situation and the prospects for the future. Rather than see the past through the lens of the present, we shall seek to highlight the need to understand the complex processes that helped to shape the racial politics of British society, and to suggest possible avenues for change in the future.
Broadening the Analytical Frame
In developing the substantive focus of Race and Racism in Britain, we have taken the view that it is important to utilise an analytical frame that can help us to situate current preoccupations against the background of both broader
historical trends as well as ongoing and largely unfnished conversations about the present. Tis is because until the current conjuncture, the study of race and racism in British society has been focused on a narrow range of issues, whether in terms of politics or policy agendas. To be sure, there is a long history of research in this feld, much of it going back to the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s, but its contribution to our understanding of both the history and the contemporary forms of racism and racial categorisation in British society remains at best limited. Tere have been eforts to develop a broader analytical frame that can account for trends at both localised and national levels (Connell 2019; El-Enany 2020; Perry 2016). Indeed, an important feature of research in this feld in the decades from the 1960s and 1970s onwards is that we have seen the publication of a sizeable corpus of scholarship that provides us with detailed and nuanced knowledge about specifc communities, their experiences of migration and settlement, and particular histories of discrimination in specifc contexts such as employment, housing, and service delivery (Bloch and Solomos 2010; Chattoo et al. 2019). Such studies have made valuable contributions to our knowledge of the migration patterns and settlement of specifc communities, and their positioning in British society. Tey have also helped to provide a substantive body of research that has informed social and policy debates in this feld over the past few decades.
Yet there is only a limited body of research on the relationship between the processes of racial categorisation and social and political relations in contemporary British society more generally. Tis neglect is hard to understand, given the relatively high profle that racial questions have occupied on political and public policy agendas since the 1960s through to the end of the twentieth century, and even more so at the beginning of the twenty-frst century (El-Enany 2020; Shilliam 2018). It is to remedy this relative neglect of broader historical and contemporary connections that we have adopted a broader analytical frame than much of the scholarship in this feld. Terefore, rather than limit the focus of this book to political and policy debates about race and immigration as such, we have broadened our analytical frame to cover not only the evolution of ofcial discourses but to explore the role of political mobilisations about race and immigration, the role of antidiscrimination policies, the role of policing, the impact of urban unrest, debates about cultural and religious diference, and social divisions and inequalities. In including these issues within the focus of Race and Racism in Britain, we want to suggest that researchers, teachers, and students in this feld need to frame what is covered by this area of scholarship and research in quite broad terms, such that it can capture the evolving terms of social and political debates as they take shape either in specifc societies or in broader geopolitical environments.
Rather than seeing the study of race and racism as fxed on a set of issues, we are suggesting that researchers need to pay much more attention to the ways in which the meanings attached to ideas about race are socially constructed and evolve over time, space, and social context. In the present environment, for example, the changing forms of racial discourse in British society have been shaped by a broader set of societal changes during the second half of the twentieth century and the frst three decades of the twenty-frst century. Political debates on immigration and multiculturalism over the past few decades have done little to challenge the confusion and political uncertainty that have shaped policy changes in this area ever since the Second World War and the period of decolonisation in the 1950s and 1960s. Tey have also highlighted the need to situate the position of ethnic and racial minorities against the background of wider changes in the political economy of a Britain that has experienced not just immigration and racial diversity, but ongoing transformations brought about by decolonisation, political tensions about its relationship to the rest of Europe and debates about the break-up of the political union with Scotland (Gilroy 2004; Schofeld 2013; Schwarz 2011, 2020). It is important therefore not to lose sight of these broader transformations in Britain’s global role when focusing on the question of the specifc role of race and immigration in shaping political and social debates through the past few decades.
In framing the book, the way that we have we are also suggesting that any rounded analysis of race and racism in Britain needs to address the wideranging conceptual and theoretical debates that have surrounded the study of race and racism more generally. Tis is partly because, although this book is not concerned with theoretical debates as such, it remains important to address some of the conceptual problems raised by key notions such as race and racism, since contemporary research agendas have been in many ways shaped by ongoing theoretical debates and controversies. We have engaged with key facets of these debates in other studies (Solomos 2022; Solomos and Back 1996), but it is also important to touch on them in this book as well since it is against the background of these ongoing conceptual controversies that scholars have sought to analyse the key transformations in the role of race and racism in British society over the past few decades. We shall engage with these broader theoretical discussions in Chap. 2, but in addition, we shall be returning to some key conceptual issues throughout the book and in Chap. 12. It is also important to touch on these conceptual issues early on in this book because contemporary theorists are not in agreement about the meaning of key concepts such as race, racism, and racialisation and often use them in a wide variety of analytical frameworks (Elias and Feagin 2016; Emirbayer and
Desmond 2015; Solomos 2020). Indeed, in contemporary scholarship, a lively debate has developed on the terminology used by social scientists to discuss these issues. It is therefore necessary to clarify how these concepts will be used in this book. Taking the concept of race frst, notwithstanding the long history of debates on this term, it has long been recognised that races do not exist in any scientifcally meaningful sense. Yet in many societies, people continue to act as if race exists as a fxed objective category, and this belief is refected in political discourses and at the level of popular ideas. Commonplace classifcations of race have relied on a variety of variables—such as skin colour, country of origin, religion, nationality, and language—to defne groups of people, and operate with the common-sense notion that races do exist. What are the consequences of racial categorisation for politics, ideology, and social action? How does the meaning attached to race as a social category generate political debate and discourses? Tese are some of the questions that this book addresses in the context of contemporary British society, and its central focus is the construction of, and changing meanings attached to, the category of race and how in specifc contexts race has become a signifer for a range of social problems and conficts.
Moving on to the concept of racism, as we shall explain in more detail in Chap. 2, we shall use the notion of racism to cover ideologies and social processes that discriminate against others because of their putatively diferent racial membership. Tough there is some merit in the argument that we should not over-stretch the usage of the concept of racism, it is also important to acknowledge that there is little to be gained from seeing racism narrowly as a signifer of claims to biological superiority, since it has become clear in recent years that the focus on attributed biological inferiority is being replaced in racist discourse by a concern with culture and ethnicity as historically fxed categories (M’Charek 2013; Skinner 2016). Terefore, a central argument in this book is that racism is not a static phenomenon. In countries such as Britain, racism is produced and reproduced through political discourse, the media and social media, the education system, and other institutions. In this wider social context, racism has become an integral element of diverse social issues, such as law and order, crime, the inner cities, and urban unrest. In this sense, the notion of racism that we are working with in this study shares much with George Mosse’s understanding of it as an ideology that has to be situated in specifc historical and social contexts in order to make sense of it (Mosse 1985, 1995).
Tese are issues that we shall return to during the substantive chapters that follow, including the critical review of conceptual and theoretical debates about the changing boundaries of the study of race and racism that is the
focus of Chap. 2. But the important point to emphasise here is that a key argument that underpins this book is that there is a need to broaden our analytical frame to make sense of the key processes that form the substantive concerns of this book. As a way of illustrating what this broader analytical frame involves, we now move on to discuss the importance of thinking about race in the present, the changing role of race and racism in British society, and how to situate the British experience in a broader comparative frame.
Thinking About Race in the Present
An important theme that runs through this book is a concern to locate the changing dynamics of race and racism within the context of a broader historical perspective while at the same time not losing sight of the specifcities of the present political and social conjuncture. Although there is clearly much value in engaging in a dialogue with broader historical narratives about the role of race in helping to shape social and political relations in British society, it is also important to remain focused on the complex dynamics that are helping to shape the contemporary situation. We shall discuss the links between historical processes and the present in more detail in Chap. 3, but we also want to argue that it is important not to reduce the complexities of the contemporary situation to a deterministic frame that does not account for the transformations that we are living through over the past few decades. Tis is particularly important at a time when we are witnessing signifcant transformations in the social and political meanings that are attached to race and ethnicity in British society. Indeed, much of the argument that we develop in the substantive chapters of this book is framed around the need to make sense of the present in all its complexity, while not losing sight of the historical processes that have helped to shape the current conjuncture. In a sense, of course, this is the starting point of all sociological analysis since we seek to make sense of the everyday and underlying processes that shape the world around us as well as our own experiences. But it is important to re-emphasise the need for an analytical frame that avoids the twin dangers of presentism and historical determinism. A good example of this can be found in the changing role of racist social and political movements. A growing body of scholarship has highlighted the resurgence of racist social and political movements in Britain and a wide range of European societies during the past three decades, at least partly because of the mobilisation of anti-immigrant sentiments and fears about what growing forms of racial and cultural diference mean for dominant forms of national identity (Husbands 2020; Wodak et al. 2013). Alongside this trend, we have
seen the development of new patterns of migration and heated political debate on the best ways to respond to the everyday realities of racial and ethnic diversity, religious identities, multiculturalism, and the challenge posed by new patterns of migration, asylum, and refugee movement (Boulila 2019; Mondon and Winter 2020; Valluvan 2018). Widespread reportage in the media has highlighted the emergence of new forms of racism and the impact they are having in a variety of national contexts. Indeed, in many countries, immigration, the position of minorities, and the growing numbers of refugees have become key issues on the political agenda, shaping the ideologies of both leftwing and right-wing political parties. At the same time, the debate on immigration has become inextricably tied up with wider preoccupations about the social and political position of established ethnic and racial minority communities, many of whose members cannot be viewed as immigrants in any meaningful sense. Nonetheless the social and political status of second- and third-generation descendants of settled migrants is the subject of intense and in many cases hostile public debate.
Tese trends are by no means unique to the British situation. Over the past few decades, we have seen have seen how volatile questions about immigration and race relations have become across a wide range of geopolitical environments, most notably in a wide range of European societies and in America (Kellner 2017; Pitts 2020). During the past few decades, we have seen an ongoing and often divisive conversation across European societies about questions linked to immigration, race, and religious or cultural diversity. Although much of the attention has been on the emergence of extreme right-wing movements and ideologies, it is also important to note that this conversation has also impacted on how more mainstream political parties of both the left and right have dealt with questions about race and immigration. In the American context, the election of Barack Obama in 2008 and 2012 as the frst black president led to some debate about whether his election could be seen as a sign that America was perhaps moving towards dealing with the historical legacies of slavery, racial segregation, and racialised violence (Coates 2017; Dyson 2016; Parker 2016). Whatever the optimism about race relations at the time of Obama’s election in 2008, this has subsequently been questioned by the election in 2016 of Donald Trump, who stood on a political platform that emphasised both an anti-immigration stance as well as appealing to the interests of white majority communities in American society (Bonilla-Silva 2019; Lamont et al. 2017; Waldinger 2018).
Tis is not to say that we have seen a uniform response to these challenges. Rather, we have seen somewhat divergent policy agendas. On the one hand,
Introduction
there has been growing racism and hostility towards migrants, with rightwing political parties and neo-fascist groupings using fears about immigration, growing multiculturalism, and the dilution of the whiteness of national cultures to attract support. On the other hand, both national and more localised policies have been introduced to deal with the social integration of minority communities, partly in response to concerns about the impact of racial, ethnic, and religious diversity on social cohesion and national identity. Both phenomena are part of the uneasy compromises on the question of immigration and the evolving position of racial and ethnic minorities that have shaped public policy on immigration and race across Europe over the past few decades. Such trends emphasise the need for us to be aware of the complex set of policies that are part of the public culture of Britain and other European countries. Moreover, contemporary developments in both Europe and the United States can be seen as important watersheds in terms of the racialisation of politics and the resurgence of avowedly racist political movements.
Such trends have led to widespread concern in Britain and Europe more generally about the prospects that lie ahead at the beginning of the twentyfrst century. Several key questions have been hotly debated and remain part of an ongoing conversation in Britain as well as other societies. Are we witnessing the emergence of new forms of racism and anti-immigrant mobilisation? What is the prospect of developing an adequate response to racism whether in the form of antiracism or a commitment to promoting racial equality? Is there evidence that racial and minority communities are developing their own political agency and strategies for the future? What can be done to tackle the root causes of racism and racial inequality in contemporary societies? To what extent have we seen the emergence of policies and strategies that address racialised inequalities? Is there evidence that we are seeing the emergence of a post-racial society? Tese are just some of the questions that need to be addressed if we are to make sense of contemporary trends, both in Britain and other societies.
It should be clear, however, from what has been said already that the present situation is best characterised as inherently unstable and contradictory. It is therefore important to go beyond the obvious and refect on key aspects of the current situation, the historical background to current issues and alternative models about how best to address questions about race and racism both in the present and in the future. Before we can make a reasoned assessment of likely trends and the possibilities for action, we need to situate present events against the social processes and political debates that have shaped them.
Race and Racism in British Society
We can trace the origins of the study of race and racism in British society to the 1940s and 1950s, when the work of scholars such as Kenneth Little, Michael Banton, and Anthony Richmond (Banton 1955, 1957, 1959; Little 1958, 1972; Richmond 1954, 1961) established the foundations of the academic study of the social and cultural impact of migrant incorporation and exclusion. Later, in the 1960s and 1970s, the scholarship of John Rex, Sheila Patterson, Ruth Glass, Sheila Allen (Allen 1971; Glass 1960; Patterson 1965, 1969; Rex 1970; Rex and Moore 1967), and others produced valuable insights into the political sociology of race and ethnicity in British society. Yet by the late 1980s and 1990s, when the First and Second Editions of this book was published, the study of race and racism was still very much on the margins of key social science disciplines such as sociology and politics. At the time, there were relatively few specialised courses at the undergraduate and postgraduate levels, and scholarly debate and research was concentrated in a few major research centres in the United States and Britain. In key social science disciplines such as sociology, political science, and geography, the study of race and racism remained at best marginal if not absent from the core curriculum, often present only through specialised courses. At the same time there was relatively little of a broader research culture in many disciplines that focused on questions about race and racism, and in some cases, this also tended to be situated in relatively marginal specialised research centres that were often tasked with the need to produce research that informed both academic and policy discourses (Banton n.d.; Rex 1981).
Te situation is now markedly diferent. Trough the frst three decades of the twenty-frst century, there has been a major transformation in this feld and a noticeable fowering of theorising and research on race and racism. It is also evident that the study of race and racism is now of some importance in a wide range of academic disciplines, including sociology, politics, cultural studies, history, anthropology, geography, and literary theory. As a number of scholars have noted, we still have some way to go before the study of race and racism becomes an established part of the curriculum across the social sciences and humanities (Crenshaw et al. 2019; Valdez and Golash-Boza 2017). But given the wider pressures to broaden the curriculum, as represented by the demands to modernise and decolonise disciplinary or interdisciplinary programmes, there can be little doubt that we are now at a rather diferent stage than we were even as late as the last two decades of the twentieth century. Indeed, it can be argued that far from being a marginal feld of scholarship
