Class, Caste, and Unapologetic Racism

Next Tuesday, November 8, is Election Day in the United States, and voting rights are one of the many areas where systemic racism rears its ugly head. Given the right-wing wave that’s swept the globe in recent years, I’d be interested to hear how voting rights for non-White citizens have been affected in other countries. International readers, please feel free to reply to this email and fill me in on the state of affairs in your country. 

Speaking of other countries, in last week’s newsletter, I started looking at racism in Europe, specifically in Germany and Spain. (If you missed it, check it out here.) In short, Germany’s shame from the Nazi era has left its policies on racism lacking in a big way, limiting Germans’ ability to use the words “race” and “racism,” which impedes the ability to talk honestly about the problem. In contrast, Spain has little national shame when it comes to racism and sees its history as evidence of benevolent colonialism. Compared to German culture, the Spanish culture and way of life are less foreign to most people of color, allowing for easier social integration—even if positions of power remain off-limits to Spaniards of color. Both countries have witnessed a rise in support of extreme in right-wing ideologies.

This week, we’re heading north of Spain to explore racism in the United Kingdom and France. First up, the UK.

In the United Kingdom, it’s class…and caste

Of all the countries in Europe, the United Kingdom is arguably the most similar to the United States—linguistically, culturally, socially, and politically. Yet, for all its similarities, its relationship to racism feels noticeably different. 

I’ve spent years traveling to the UK, including a period of residency from 2013 to 2015, while I worked at a British university. Living as a Black man in England (specifically in Brighton, which is politically divergent from other regions of the country) felt different than living in the US. In the US race has historically been the most important determinant—inescapable and often absolute—of people’s social standing as well as of many economic and political outcomes: where you could sit on public transportation, which water fountains and bathrooms you could use, where you could live, where you could work, whether you got paid for your labor, whom you could marry, how you’re treated during police encounters…the list goes on and on.

During my time in England, race did not seem to be the first cut in determining the stratification of society. It’s not that race didn’t matter in the UK—it certainly did, and does (more on that in a moment). It simply didn’t appear to carry the overwhelming and unavoidable significance that it did in the US. Historically speaking, British society has been stratified by class, and in contemporary society, nationality seems to carry an especially heavy focus (think: Brexit). Having said this, Great Britain is the most formidable colonizer the world has ever known, with an empire spanning the entire globe. This colonial heritage, in addition to active participation in the slave trade, has led to a society in which class is interwoven with a certain level of pigmentocracy.

The importance of class

More than any other factor I noticed during my years living there, class seemed to play the biggest role in determining social status. Unlike in the US, where class is merely a measure of affluence, class in the UK is not determined by financial affluence alone. Myriad factors take priority over wealth in determining where you fall in the pecking order: your family’s pedigree, which region of the country you’re from, your occupation (though not your salary), and even how you speak. It’s true: Whereas in the US, we have regional dialects, in the UK they have sociolects, which can be defined as “the dialect of a particular social class”. Your accent is expressly tied to your class, so in many cases you can discern someone’s class the moment they open their mouth.

This means that there is a highly complex set of linguistic factors that are correlated with social class, and almost everyone in the UK easily recognizes them. There is even a multi-million dollar industry dedicated to teaching people how to speak “properly.” Many parents enroll their kids in these “elocution classes,” as they’re called, so that they might acquire a “posh” accent and, thus, get a leg up in life. It’s a bizarre, real-life analog of the classic film My Fair Lady. 

Class is designated by locale, too. Interestingly, most of the people in British housing projects (or “council estates,” as they are called) are White, and the stereotypical image of a “thug” (or “chav,” as they are called) is also White. Contrasted with the prevalent image of poorer, rural White people in the States, this designation in the UK speaks to primarily urban White people who are seen as having low levels of education and cultural sophistication, and high levels of alcoholism and violence. In fact, Burberry faced a marketing crisis in the early 2000s when “chavs” started wearing their caps and clothing, thereby undermining the prestige of the brand. 

Unlike their rural counterparts in the US, however, this group is not necessarily seen as being racist. In fact, many of them have assimilated African American culture and music and are more socially integrated with people of color. Interracial couples are extremely common in council estates, marking a very different attitude from the “over my dead body” stance that American rural White culture displays toward interracial marriage, particularly in the Deep South.

Coming from the US, I expected to experience a lot of discrimination when it came time to look for an apartment to rent. After all, Black renters and buyers experience severe discrimination in this arena here. To my surprise, I found that several agents wanted me to live in their apartments because I was a university professor and thus, presumably, “posh.” One of them called me relentlessly to ask if I was still interested in the flat, saying she would rather rent it to me than the guy who viewed it after me (a White man who, judging from his accent, did not seem upper-class. It seemed entirely odd and unfamiliar to me to be shown preference over a White British person who was deemed of “lower” class.

I saw this preference at work as well. One of my allies in the department at the university was a White woman from the northern part of the country. She had grown up in a council estate and was ostracized by fellow White British faculty members. Because she came from a place and family of lower status in British society, her professional peers did not accept her—despite her having earned a PhD and being an outstanding teacher and researcher. One particularly snobbish colleague referred to her as a “Glasgow street fighter” following a faculty meeting—a snide reference to what he perceived to be her crass upbringing.

Even Kate Middleton, Princess of Wales, experienced a level of class scrutiny when her relationship with Prince William became public. She grew up in an upper-middle-class family and was well-educated, yet it was reported several times that William’s friends and members of the public didn’t believe she was suitable because she wasn’t “posh enough.” Controversy sparked after her mother said “pleased to meet you” to the Queen when, according to British elocution rules, she should have said, “How do you do?” As Americans, it’s difficult to imagine that such subtle cues in language can mark deep-seated differences in class.  

World conquest and colonialism

Despite the traditional emphasis on class, nationality and race do determine social status in the UK. I would attribute this, in large part, to the long history of British imperialism and colonialism. In its heyday, the British Empire spanned nearly every corner of the globe. In fact, to this day, the Commonwealth stretches across multiple continents, and the death of Queen Elizabeth II has sparked renewed debate over whether or not certain countries will remain in the Commonwealth. 

What does this have to do with racism? 

The fact that the British Empire touched countries far and wide meant that the Brits subjugated people of many different races, not just those of African descent. They colonized African nations, such as Ghana and South Africa, but they also colonized India, Honduras, and Malta. The British monarchy—and the predominantly White nation it served—occupied countries with significant indigenous populations like Australia, Canada, and New Zealand (not to mention the US) and thereafter sought to dominate both the indigenous populations and the White immigrants who moved there. Their colonial pursuits were not exclusive to nations with non-White populations: To this day, there is significant tension between White Britons and White Irish and Welsh, due to the history of oppression against the Celtic peoples.

Power and status, therefore, are closely linked to nationality. In some cases, race is still implicated in that; in others, it doesn’t play a role. Take Ireland or Wales, for instance, each of which have long-held disdain for England’s dominance in the region and, subsequently, long-running independence movements. Whereas most Americans wouldn’t perceive much of a difference between an Irish man versus an English man, in the United Kingdom, the difference runs deep. Eastern European populations, mostly from Poland and Romania, are a more recent example: They were the primary targets of expulsion during Brexit.

British history of slavery

None of this is to say the UK does not have a history with racism against Black people, similar to that of the US. They also engaged in the Atlantic slave trade and enslaved Africans and their descendents. However, their overall history of slavery went back centuries further than the Atlantic slave trade and involved people of many different countries and races (including White Britons of lower classes). As such, they did not associate slavery exclusively with Black or African people. And they never passed legislation to make it legal. Therefore, they didn’t develop a caste system based on race the same way that the US did.

Furthermore, the UK’s land limited the importance of agriculture to the nation’s economy. The land is, and was, difficult to farm. It was not good for large-scale farming and didn’t support the growth of cash crops, both of which were significant in the United States and influential in its legal establishment and institutional entrenchment of slavery. Thus, the UK did not have chattel slavery in the way we did in the States, and slavery on the whole was never as consequential to the British economy as it was for America. 

However, it’s important to recognize that they “outsourced” it. The ran their plantations “offshore” in Jamaica, Barbados, and other Caribbean nations. But the average British person did not have to be directly implicated in this enterprise in the same way that Southern White Americans were.

Institutional racism in the UK today

Does institutional racism exist in the UK today? Following the Black Lives Matter protests that spread across the globe in response to the murder of George Floyd, the UK government ordered a report on racism and ethnic discrimination in the country by the then–newly established Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities. The Commission presented its report in March 2021 and asserted that while there may be overt acts of racism, there was no institutional racism. 

However, a UN Working Group of Experts on People of African Descent lambasted the report in a scathing statement the following month. According to the Working Group, the report’s conclusion was objectively incorrect and harmful, and it ignored reputable analysis of institutional racism by international human rights experts. Their statement reads: 

In a Trades Union Congress report from September, the UN experts’ assertions were backed up by even more data. The TUC found that 41% of Black, Brown, and minority workers in the UK have experienced racism on the job, including racist bullying and harassment; 44% didn’t report incidents of racism because they didn’t believe they’d be taken seriously; and almost half indicated they’d experienced some form of discrimination “consistent with institutional racism.”

In short, there are differences in the nature of racial discrimination in the US and the UK…but there are many more commonalities. 

In France, unapologetic racism abounds

A short trip over the English channel brings us to France, where racism is as free-flowing as the wine. One summer in the 90s, I went to Paris on a program for American students to get to work in France for three months. I wanted to work in a French bistro to experience French culture from that vantage point. I spoke the language fluently. But in interview after interview, I was denied. In fact, while several of my White peers in the program were able to secure jobs, not one of the Black students did. Many ended up working at McDonald’s because it was the only place that would hire them.

Some owners and managers were honest (or brazen, depending on how you see it) enough to tell me point-blank that it was because I was Black. They were matter-of-fact and unapologetic. One went so far as to give his rationale: “It’s not me; it’s my customers. They would rather be served by a White person.” The situation was shocking. Even in America, where racism runs rampant, it would be almost impossible to not find a blue-collar job anywhere—as a well-educated individual, no less—purely on the basis of race.

This reality was especially jarring to me given my expectation of a very open and accepting France. After all, this was the adopted home of Nina Simone, Josephine Baker, James Baldwin, and other African American artists and writers who fled to France in the 1950s and 60s to escape oppressive Jim Crow restrictions in the US. It’s important to keep in mind, however, that societies change, and sometimes in opposite directions. Comparing the US and France in the 1950s is not the same as comparing them today.

Lest you think my experience in France was unique, think again. A recent study compared the magnitude of racial and ethnic discrimination across nine North American and European countries. Guess which nation showed the strongest pattern of discrimination?

France...followed closely by Sweden.

The racism of the far-right

As you might imagine, Paris was extremely segregated at the time—and still is. Much of the Black and Arab populations are relegated to the outer suburbs of the city, called banlieues, and most people in those communities struggle to get jobs. In the 1970s, the term “banlieues” had become equivalent to “housing projects” and became associated with images of crime and urban decay. As a result, the banlieues and the communities who lived there became the target of political anti-crime rhetoric and increased law enforcement under the far-right party leader Jean-Marie Le Pen. 

That surname is now familiar to even the youngest readers of this newsletter. Jean-Marie Le Pen’s youngest daughter, Marine Le Pen, has become a major political force in the country, with her rise charting the troubling growth in popularity of the far-right—a rise that is linked in no uncertain terms to racism. As immigration has increased in France and the rest of Europe over the last several years, so has racism, xenophobia, Islamophobia, and antisemitism. Marine Le Pen has capitalized on those racist beliefs, using fear tactics and underlining White supremacist ideology. 

Modern-day bans on race data, plus pressure to change

On the surface, the French liberal government believes in equality and gives lip service to the fight against discrimination—and has for years. They view themselves as a paragon of human rights among Western nations. But beneath the surface, you find an issue similar to that of Germany: German law forbids the use of language and classification pertaining to race; French law forbids the collection of data on the basis of race, ethnicity, or religion. 

Like Germany’s law, France’s came out of World War II, during which the French system classifying Jewish citizens allowed the Nazis to identify and deport Jews to concentration camps. The law banning data collection on race and religion may have come from a place of “good” intent, but the result is a façade of a “colorblind” society that White constituents still buy into but which definitively harms any hope of true equity or anti-discrimination efforts for non-Whites. Several prominent people and organizations have publicly decried the policy forbidding data collection on race, and more and more have put pressure on President Emmanuel Macron to revisit and reconsider the country’s laws. So far, he has refused to do so.

While institutionally, the reticence to address racism continues, in French media we’re starting to see a different story. In recent years, more French television shows have begun to feature non-White characters. The Netflix hit Lupin, starring French-Senegalese actor Omar Sy, uses a popular character in French literature, the gentleman burglar and master of disguise Arsène Lupin, as a vehicle to examine the role of racism, and colonialism in particular, in modern France. Standing Up, also on Netflix, follows four characters, all of different races and backgrounds, as they navigate Paris’s stand-up comedy scene. While naturally comedic, the show doesn’t back down from examining topics of race, class, gender, intersectionality, nationalism, and discrimination. 

For a country struggling with racism, these shows provide a glimpse of hope that a more honest, candid confrontation of the country’s relationship to race could make its way from TV into political institutions in the future.

Exploring other forms and contexts of racism

While this newsletter took a brief look at the role of racism in just four European countries, in future newsletters, we’ll look at racism and the history of Black people in Canada—specifically in Nova Scotia, where there is (perhaps surprisingly) a rich Black culture dating back to the 1700s. We’ll also dive into colorism among people of the same race as well as racism between people from different racial and ethnic groups.

The take-home point here is clear. The US does not hold a monopoly on racism. Unfortunately, it is a social ill that can be found throughout the world. Raising awareness of this inconvenient truth is a necessary first step toward combating what is a decidedly global disease.