Michael Lavalette - Race, Racism and Social Work: Contemporary Issues and Debates

RACE, RACISM AND SOCIAL WORK

Contemporary issues and debates

Edited by Michael Lavalette and Laura Penketh

First published in Great Britain in 2014 by

Policy Press University of Bristol 6th Floor Howard House Queens Avenue Clifton Bristol BS8 1SD UK Tel +44 (0)117 331 5020 Fax +44 (0)117 331 5367 e-mail

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Policy Press 2014

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ISBN 978 1 44731 213 0 epub
ISBN 978 1 44731 214 7 Kindle

The right of Michael Lavalette and Laura Penketh to be identified as editors of this work has been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved: no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without the prior permission of Policy Press.

The statements and opinions contained within this publication are solely those of the authors and not of the University of Bristol or Policy Press. The University of Bristol and Policy Press disclaim responsibility for any injury to persons or property resulting from any material published in this publication.

Policy Press works to counter discrimination on grounds of gender, race, disability, age and sexuality.

Cover design by Qube Design Associates, Bristol
Front cover image: www.istock.com

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Contents

Introduction: Race, racism and social work
Michael Lavalette and Laura Penketh

one Rethinking anti-racist social work in a neoliberal age
Gurnam Singh

two The growth of xeno-racism and Islamophobia in Britain
Liz Fekete

three The catalysers: black professionals and the anti-racist movement
Charlotte Williams

four Same, same, but different
Philomena Harrison and Beverley Burke

five Antisemitism and anti-racist social work
Barrie Levine

six Anti-Roma racism in Europe: past and recent perspectives
pela Urh

seven In defence of multiculturalism?
Gareth Jenkins

eight Social work and Islamophobia: identity formation among second and third generation Muslim women in north-west England
Laura Penketh

nine Institutionalised Islamophobia and the Prevent agenda: winning hearts and minds or welfare as surveillance and control?
Michael Lavalette

ten Street-grooming, sexual abuse and Islamophobia: an anatomy of the Rochdale abuse scandal
Judith Orr

eleven My people?
Dave Stamp

twelve Twenty-first century eugenics? A case study about the Merton Test
Rhetta Moran and Susan Gillett

thirteen The role of immigration policies in the exploitation of migrant care workers: an ethnographic exploration
Joe Greener

Conclusion: Race, racism and social work today: some concluding thoughts
Laura Penketh and Michael Lavalette

Beverley Burke is a senior lecturer in social work at Liverpool John Moores University, UK.

Liz Fekete is executive director of the Institute of Race Relations and author of A suitable enemy: Racism, migration and Islamophobia in Europe (Pluto 2009).

Susan Gillett is an experienced frontline social work practitioner. She specialises in work with young people, including unaccompanied asylum seeking children.

Joe Greener is a lecturer in social policy at Liverpool Hope University.

Philomena Harrison is a senior lecturer in social work at Liverpool Hope University.

Gareth Jenkins has recently retired from London South Bank University.

Michael Lavalette is professor of social work at Liverpool Hope University and national co-ordinator of the Social Work Action Network. He is co-editor of the new journal Critical and Radical Social Work .

Barrie Levine is a senior lecturer in social work at Glasgow Caledonian University. He is on the national steering committee of the Social Work Action Network.

Rhetta Moran works and campaigns alongside ayslum seekers and refugees. She initiated www.rapar.org.uk in 2001 and co-edited the book Doing research with refugees (2006) published by Policy Press.

Judith Orr is a journalist and a member of the executive committee of Abortion Rights.

Laura Penketh is a senior lecturer in social work and social policy at Liverpool Hope University. She is the author of Tackling institutional racism (Policy Press 2000).

Gurnam Singh is principal lecturer in social work at Coventry University.

Dave Stamp is a frontline worker in Birmingham.

pela Urh is a lecturer in social work at Ljubljana University.

Charlotte Williams is professor of social work at RMIT, Melbourne.

Working within higher education (HE) is becoming more intense by the year; the marketisation of higher education means there is greater pressure on lecturers to publish more, teach more, market courses, sell universities, and carry out increased levels of administration. A recent survey by the lecturers union, UCU, found that levels of stress and anxiety within academia were higher than in any comparable profession.

Given these unpalatable truths, we would like to thank all our contributors for finding the time and space to complete their chapters for us. We hope we have not added to their stress burdens too much!

The idea for this book came out of a number of debates and conferences organised by the Social Work Action Network over the last few years. We would like to take this opportunity to thank our friends and colleagues for providing, within SWAN, an open public space where debates can be aired and solutions practical and theoretical tried out.

The danger of naming people is that we will forget someone vitally important to our recent political and philosophical trajectory. Nevertheless, we would like to thank our friends, colleagues and comrades at Liverpool Hope University and within SWAN, who have supported us while we were putting this project together. In particular, wed like to thank Chris Jones, Vassilis Ioakimidis, Rich Moth and Iain Ferguson.

Karen Bowler at Policy Press was supportive of the book proposal from the very beginning. Karen has now moved on to other projects with her new family, and we wish her well. Isobel Bainton has taken the project over since Karens departure and has ensured that we have worked to a tight (and entirely appropriate) time schedule. We would like to thank Isobel and her team for their support.

At our shared home, putting the book together was often at the expense of spending time with our children. Although our daughters are now at an age where they dont want to spend too much time with us, we would like to thank Saskia and Olivia for their patience! Finally, in the middle of writing and organising this book, Sheila Lavalette, mum, mum-in-law and friend, passed away suddenly. Despite our great loss we are sustained, in part, by the knowledge that Sheila was always appalled by all injustices and discrimination. We dedicate this book, with love, to her memory.

In memoriam

Sheila Lavalette

(19422012)

Race

Race is a social construct and not a scientifically valid reality. The science of genetics has demonstrated that there is more statistically significant genetic diversity within population groups than between them, and that the physiological differences associated with race have no more significance than hair or eye colour. However, most people think that races exist and as a concept it continues to shape patterns of discrimination and disadvantage.