By Andreas Harsono  

  A violent attack by security forces and an ultranationalist mob on a West Papuan student dormitory in Surabaya, East Java, on August 17, 2019, prompted street protests in at least 33 cities across Indonesia. Bolstering the protests was a social media campaign called #PapuanLivesMatter, inspired by the Black Lives Matter movement in the United States seeking racial justice. The Indonesian authorities arrested hundreds for joining the anti-racism protests, and 109 people were convicted for “treason.” “If It’s Not Racism, What Is It?” finds that the protests renewed discussions on racial discrimination in Indonesia against Indigenous Papuans because of their ethnic origin, and sparked fresh demands for sovereignty for West Papua. It profiles cases of Papuan activists prosecuted after the Papuan Lives Matter protests and describes ongoing human rights violations rooted in racial discrimination, in particular, the right to education and the highest attainable standard of health. It also documents recent abuses by security forces and Papuan militants during the ongoing armed conflict in West Papua. Over the past six decades, Indonesian authorities, in countering the pro-independence movement and insurgency in West Papua, have often promoted divisiveness by describing Papuans as unruly and violent. The report calls on the Indonesian government to review regulations and practices that marginalize the community, to allow foreign journalists and international rights monitors to visit the territory, and to conduct public education to end racism against people of Papuan ethnic origin.  

New York: Human Rights Watch, 2024. 86p.

By Simone Drake, James Phelan, Robyn Warhol, and Lisa Zunshine

Black Women’s Stories of Everyday Racism puts literary narrative theory to work on an urgent real-world problem. The book calls attention to African American women’s everyday experiences with systemic racism and demonstrates how four types of narrative theory can help generate strategies to explain and dismantle that racism. This volume presents fifteen stories told by eight midwestern African American women about their own experiences with casual and structural racism, followed by four detailed narratological analyses of the stories, each representing a different approach to narrative interpretation. The book makes a case for the need to hear the personal stories of these women and others like them as part of a larger effort to counter the systemic racism that prevails in the United States today. Readers will find that the women’s stories offer powerful evidence that African Americans experience racism as an inescapable part of their day-to-day lives—and sometimes as a force that radically changes their lives. The stories provide experience-based demonstrations of how pervasive systemic racism is and how it perpetuates power differentials that are baked into institutions such as schools, law enforcement, the health care system, and business. Containing countless signs of the stress and trauma that accompany and follow from experiences of racism, the stories reveal evidence of the women’s resilience as well as their unending need for it, as they continue to feel the negative effects of experiences that occurred many years ago. The four interpretive chapters note the complex skill involved in the women’s storytelling. The analyses also point to the overall value of telling these stories: how they are sometimes cathartic for the tellers; how they highlight the importance of listening—and the likelihood of misunderstanding—and how, if they and other stories like them were heard more often, they would be a force to counteract the structural racism they so graphically expose.

London; New York: Routledge, 2024. 137p

By Darder, Antonia and Torres, Rodolfo D.

After Race pushes us beyond the old "race vs. class" debates to delve deeper into the structural conditions that spawn racism. Darder and Torres place the study of racism forthrightly within the context of contemporary capitalism. While agreeing with those who have argued that the concept of "race" does not have biological validity, they go further to insist that the concept also holds little political, symbolic, or descriptive value when employed in social science and policy research. Darder and Torres argue for the need to jettison the concept of "race," while calling adamantly for the critical study of racism. They maintain that an understanding of structural class inequality is fundamentally germane to comprehending the growing significance of racism in capitalist America.

New York: NYU Press, 2004.

By John Stone

Historical Context: The study of race relations became central insociology post-World War II, influenced by decolonization and civilrights movements.

Power Dynamics: Minority groups' power and influence are crucial in understanding racial conflicts and social changes.

Global Perspective: Racial and ethnic conflicts are not limited to the West but are a global phenomenon, affecting socialist and capitalist societies alike.

Social Institutions: Race relations impact various social institutions, including education, employment, and legal systems, highlighting the complexity of achieving racial justice.

Fontana Press / Collins, 1985, 191 pages

By James B. McKee

Historical Context: The book explores the development of the sociology of race relations in the United States, highlighting its evolution from the early 20th century to the 1960s.

Sociological Failure: It critically examines the failure of sociologists to predict and understand the civil rights movement and the subsequent racial struggles in the 1960s.

Perspective Critique: The author argues that the failure was due to the sociologists' perspective, which was shaped by their own social context and often ignored the realities of racial change.

Black Sociologists' Struggle: The book also discusses the challenges faced by black sociologists in expressing their perspectives within a predominantly white academic field.

University of Illinois Press, 1993, 376 pages

By Philip Mason

Purpose and Scope: The book aims to introduce the subject of race relations, drawing on various academic disciplines like biology, psychology, and social anthropology.

Race and Behavior: The author argues that race itself does not determine intelligence or behavior, but beliefs about race significantly impact human behavior and societal structures.

Historical Context: The book discusses historical examples of race relations, including colonialism, slavery, and apartheid, highlighting their long-term effects on societies.

Intelligence: The text explores the concept of intelligence,distinguishing between innate and acquired intelligence, and emphasizes the role of environment and societal expectations in shaping intellectual capacities.

Oxford University Press, 1970, 181 pages

By Leroy Pernell

There is a war being waged against African Americans, and their ability to speak out against racial injustice, which is more intense than any past attempt at suppression, since post-reconstruction in America. This war has been characterized by state legislative initiatives aimed at denying consideration or discussion of Critical Race Theory. Under the guise of “Anti-WOKE,” states, such as Florida have sought not only to prevent serious discussion of Critical Race Theory, but to broaden the attack to deny advocacy or discussion of the more general issue of systemic role of race in our understanding of American jurisprudence, as well. These actions have, to date, resulted in legal challenges drawn from First and Fourteenth Amendment considerations. While these constitutional issues are currently in litigation and have yet to be determined, there has not been additional consideration of the possible impact of silencing voices of communities of color in ways reminiscent of the voiceless role of slaves. The Thirteenth Amendment prohibition of” Badges of Slavery” suggests an analytical perspective that has heretofore not been discussed. This brief commentary explores both the history and possible current application of the Badges of Slavery doctrine as a counter to current state legislative efforts at silencing. Because the author is currently involved in litigation challenging these attacks on First and Fourteenth Amendment grounds, discussion of those issues are not addressed here. Instead, this commentary focuses exclusively on an argument not made – the Thirteenth Amendment ban on badges of slavery. enter Abstract Body

Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=4633259

Edited by Ilke Adam Tundé Adefioye Serena D'Agostino Nick Schuermans Florian Trauner

"Migration, Equality and Racism trigger ever more salient societal debates. More than 80 VUB academics and co-authors joined forces for this book. Philosophers, lawyers, psychologists, health scientists, sociologists, geographers, criminologists, communication and political scientists … look at migration, equality and racism from different disciplinary angles. Together they aim to contribute to an exercise of humanism as a praxis of criticism or a ‘technique of trouble-making’, in the words of Edward Said. Through 44 thought-provoking and informed opinion pieces, they question widespread beliefs on migration, equality and racism and propose solutions that might disturb. Let this book be a source of inspiration for those who want to spark an informed debate on the ever more salient issues of migration, equality and racism, for those who want to learn more on how and why humanism has often remained an empty box for migrants and racialized groups. Or for those who are in search of inspiration for a just future for all. Migration, Equality and Racism is the work of Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB) think tank POINcaré and was created under the direction of Ilke Adam, Tundé Adefioye, Serena D’Agostino, Nick Schuermans and Florian Trauner."

Brussels: ASP editions - Academic and Scientific Publishers, 2021. 260p.

By Michelle Castañeda 

Michelle Castañeda lays bare the criminalization of race enacted every day in U.S. immigration courts and detention centers in order to reimagine alternatives to the deportation regimes.

Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2023. 199p.

Edited by Robert T. Chase

This volume considers the interconnection of racial oppression in the U.S. South and West, presenting thirteen case studies that explore the ways in which citizens and migrants alike have been caged, detained, deported, and incarcerated, and what these practices tell us about state building, converging and coercive legal powers, and national sovereignty. As these studies depict the institutional development and state scaffolding of overlapping carceral regimes, they also consider how prisoners and immigrants resisted such oppression and violence by drawing on the transnational politics of human rights and liberation, transcending the isolation of incarceration, detention, deportation and the boundaries of domestic law.

Durham, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 2019. 440p.

By Jessica Pandian

Despite decades of activism from bereaved people and their supporters, too often the deaths of racialised people in prison have been dismissed, and the role of racism has been overlooked and ignored.

INQUEST’s new report, Deaths of racialised people in prison 2015 – 2022: Challenging racism and discrimination, makes a powerful intervention as it uncovers new data and tells the stories of 22 racialised people and how they died preventable and premature deaths in prison.

The report specifically looks at the deaths of Black and mixed-race people; Asian and mixed-race people; Middle Eastern and mixed-race people; people of Eastern European nationality; White Irish people and White Gypsy or Irish Traveller people.

Through a literature review, an analysis of never before published data on ethnicity and deaths in prison, and an examination of the relevant inquests and investigations, the report evidences the role of  institutional racism in the prison estate.

Key issues include the inappropriate use of segregation, racial stereotyping, the hostile environment, the neglect of physical and mental health, the failure to respond to warning signs, and the bullying and victimisation of racialised people.

London: INQUEST, 2022. 80p.