Section 4. Strategies and Activities for Reducing Racial Prejudice and Racism

 

You're at a restaurant with a group of coworkers after work. You're telling them about your decision to buy a house in Western Heights and how excited you are. One coworker responds, “Are you sure you want to move there? I hear there is a lot of crime in that area. It's mostly a Black neighborhood. Did you consider Eastern Heights? You might fit in better there.”

You are surprised by the comment. The coworker has connected race with crime and assumed that you should live in a neighborhood where residents are more similar to you.

On your way home, you think more about what happened. Challenging one person's stereotype matters, but individual attitudes are only part of the issue. Housing opportunities may also be affected by real-estate practices, lending, zoning, appraisal, discrimination, public investment, and other institutional or structural conditions.

Addressing racial inequity therefore involves both interpersonal and systemic change. Communities may need to challenge stereotypes and discriminatory behavior while also examining policies, practices, institutions, and decision-making systems that create or maintain unequal treatment and opportunity.

This section focuses specifically on racial prejudice and racism. Many of the principles – such as examining bias, sharing decision-making power, changing discriminatory policies, and creating equitable systems – may also be relevant when addressing other forms of discrimination.

What is racial prejudice?

Racial prejudice refers to negative attitudes, assumptions, stereotypes, or judgments about people because of their perceived race, ethnicity, ancestry, or related identity.

Racial prejudice may be explicit and intentional, but it can also operate through assumptions that people have learned without fully recognizing them.

Examples might include:

• Assuming that a person is dangerous, unintelligent, dishonest, or unqualified because of their race.
• Treating someone's accent, name, clothing, hair, or cultural background as evidence that they do not belong.
• Expecting one person to speak for an entire racial or ethnic community.
• Making assumptions about someone's immigration status, income, education, neighborhood, or occupation based on race or ethnicity.

Addressing racial prejudice may involve education, reflection, conversation, relationship-building, accountability, and opportunities to challenge inaccurate assumptions.

Individual conversations can be useful, but they should not require the person targeted by prejudice to educate the person expressing it. Organizations and community institutions can also provide training, policies, expectations, and structures that support respectful behavior.

What is racism?

Racism is broader than an individual prejudiced belief. In this section, we use racism to refer to actions, policies, institutional practices, cultural patterns, or systems that create, reinforce, or maintain racial disadvantage or unequal access to rights, resources, opportunities, safety, or decision-making.

Racism can occur through intentional discrimination, but unequal outcomes may also be produced by policies or practices that appear neutral while creating barriers for particular racial or ethnic communities.

Examples might include:

• Discriminatory treatment in housing, lending, employment, education, health care, policing, or public services.
• Hiring or promotion systems that unnecessarily exclude qualified applicants from particular racial or ethnic communities.
• Housing practices that steer people toward or away from particular neighborhoods because of race.
• Rules, funding decisions, or organizational practices that consistently create unequal access or opportunity.
• Institutions ignoring or inadequately responding to documented patterns of racial harassment or discrimination.

Historical context matters. In the United States, racial inequality has been shaped by slavery, Indigenous dispossession, exclusionary immigration policies, segregation, discriminatory housing and lending practices, unequal access to political power, and other forms of institutional discrimination.

Racial prejudice can occur among people from many racial or ethnic backgrounds. At the same time, understanding racism requires attention to history, institutions, and power rather than treating every racial conflict as identical.

Racism can affect many areas of community life, including housing, education, employment, health, transportation, environmental conditions, media representation, policing, economic opportunity, public services, and civic participation.

Why is it important to reduce racial prejudice and racism?

Racial prejudice and racism can harm individuals, organizations, and communities.

• They can limit people's opportunities. Discrimination may affect access to employment, housing, education, health care, financial services, transportation, political participation, and other resources.
• They can prevent communities from benefiting fully from people's knowledge and abilities. Exclusion from leadership, employment, education, or civic participation can prevent individuals and communities from contributing as fully as they otherwise could.
• They can damage trust and relationships. Stereotyping, unequal treatment, and discriminatory institutions can make collaboration across communities more difficult.
• They can contribute to unequal health and well-being. Repeated exposure to discrimination, exclusion, environmental burdens, economic barriers, and chronic stress can affect health and quality of life.
• They conflict with principles of equal dignity, civil rights, and democratic participation.
• Many forms of racial discrimination are prohibited by law. Organizations should understand the requirements that apply to their work, services, employment, housing, education, or other activities.
• They can weaken community decision-making. Decisions are less likely to reflect the whole community when some groups are excluded from planning or leadership.

Racial prejudice and institutional practices can reinforce one another. Stereotypes may influence policies and decisions, while unequal systems may reinforce stereotypes by making existing disparities appear natural or inevitable.

This is why sustainable efforts usually need to address more than one level at a time.

Examples

• Residents see workers waiting at a common hiring location and assume that they are undocumented, unwilling to seek permanent employment, or otherwise responsible for their circumstances. Rather than relying on assumptions, community members can learn how local labor markets, immigration policy, transportation, employment practices, and worker protections affect the situation and can speak directly with workers and organizations that know the issue.
• A community initiative has difficulty involving Black residents. Instead of assuming that Black residents are uninterested, organizers can examine whether previous exclusion, meeting location, communication methods, organizational reputation, decision-making power, timing, transportation, or other barriers may be affecting participation. They can then work directly with residents and Black-led organizations to determine what meaningful participation would require.
• A community center wants to become more welcoming to residents from different racial and ethnic backgrounds. Changing posters, holding cultural events, or translating announcements may help, but inclusion also requires examining who participates in planning, who holds leadership positions, how decisions are made, how complaints are handled, and whether programs and policies create barriers for particular communities.

Addressing racism means addressing exclusion and inequity while expanding meaningful participation in community institutions and decisions.

How can you reduce racial prejudice and racism?

There is no single activity that eliminates racial prejudice or racism. Sustainable change usually requires work at several levels over time.

Communities may need to address:

• Individual attitudes and behavior
• Relationships among groups
• Organizational culture and practices
• Institutional policies
• Access to leadership and decision-making
• Distribution of resources and opportunities
• Accountability when discrimination occurs

Dialogue, training, cultural events, or relationship-building can be valuable, but they are not substitutes for changing discriminatory policies or practices when those are part of the problem.

Before selecting activities or strategies:

• Learn about the community and its history. Who lives there? What relationships exist among communities? What forms of racial exclusion or cooperation have shaped the area?
• Document the issue carefully. Depending on the situation, useful information may include community experiences, complaints, public records, organizational data, policies, demographic patterns, surveys, interviews, or other evidence.
• Include people directly affected. Do not rely only on established organizations or a single representative from each racial or ethnic group. Include people with different experiences within communities.
• Understand the nature and history of the problem. Is the concern new, longstanding, connected with a particular policy, or part of a broader pattern?
• Identify policies and practices that may need to change.
• Set clear short-term and long-term goals. Goals might involve reducing discriminatory behavior, changing a policy, expanding representation, improving services, increasing accountability, or addressing a racial disparity.
• Decide what meaningful progress would look like. Awareness may be an early step, but sustainable change may also require changes in leadership, policy, resources, representation, or outcomes.
• Identify available resources and needed support. This may include community relationships, facilitation, training, legal expertise, data, funding, staff time, or technical assistance.
• Consider urgency and timing. A discriminatory incident may require immediate response, while institutional reform may require sustained work over a longer period.
• Connect dialogue with action. Review the strategy to make sure it addresses both interpersonal experiences and organizational or institutional conditions when both are relevant.

Appropriate structures and processes are needed to implement and sustain these activities.

Things You Can Do in the Workplace

Use fair and inclusive recruitment and hiring practices.

Review where jobs are advertised, how qualifications are defined, who evaluates applicants, how interviews are conducted, and whether informal recruitment networks unnecessarily limit who hears about opportunities.

Build relationships with professional associations, educational institutions, community organizations, and networks that reach qualified candidates from a wide range of racial and ethnic backgrounds.

Recruitment is only the beginning. Examine retention, pay, promotion, professional development, leadership opportunities, workplace culture, and employee experiences as well.

Expand representation in leadership and decision-making.

Boards, executives, managers, committees, and other decision-making bodies should consider whether they reflect the communities, employees, or constituencies they serve.

Representation alone does not guarantee equity. People also need meaningful authority, access to information, opportunities to influence decisions, and fair pathways into leadership.

Ask employees about barriers and workplace experiences.

Organizations can use confidential surveys, listening sessions, employee-resource groups, interviews, grievance data, or other approaches to identify concerns involving discrimination, exclusion, harassment, promotion, workload, communication, or workplace culture.

Do not expect employees from marginalized communities to provide unpaid diversity expertise simply because of their identity.

Review organizational materials and communication.

Examine websites, reports, advertising, photographs, forms, publications, and other materials for stereotypes, exclusion, inappropriate terminology, or patterns in who is represented.

Create clear systems for preventing and responding to discrimination.

Organizations should have understandable policies, reporting processes, protections against retaliation, consistent investigation procedures, accountability, and appropriate follow-up.

Assign responsibility and monitor progress.

A committee, leadership team, equity office, human-resources function, or other structure may help coordinate the work, but responsibility for fair treatment should not be isolated in one committee. Leadership and the organization as a whole remain accountable.

Track whether policies and practices are producing the intended results and adjust them when necessary.

Things You Can Do in the Media

Respond when coverage relies on racial stereotypes or excludes important perspectives.

Community members can contact editors, reporters, producers, publishers, or other media organizations when coverage uses unnecessary racial identification, relies on stereotypes, excludes affected communities, or presents misleading information.

Letters to the editor, public comments, meetings, corrections requests, and other communication can help identify concerns.

Build relationships between media organizations and diverse communities.

Journalists can benefit from relationships with community organizations, researchers, professional journalism associations, local leaders, and residents who can provide context and identify sources.

Community members should not be treated merely as representatives who explain an entire racial or ethnic group. Journalists should seek multiple perspectives within communities.

Review hiring, promotion, sourcing, and editorial practices.

Media organizations can examine:

• Who works in the newsroom or organization
• Who holds leadership positions
• Which communities are regularly used as sources
• When race or ethnicity is considered relevant to a story
• How crime, immigration, poverty, neighborhoods, and public policy are described
• Whether corrections and complaints are handled consistently
• Whether photographs and headlines reinforce stereotypes

Professional associations such as the Asian American Journalists Association, South Asian Journalists Association, and National Association of Black Journalists may provide useful perspectives and professional resources.

Things You Can Do in Schools

Create opportunities for students to learn about race, racism, history, and diverse communities.

Student organizations, classroom discussions, cultural programs, historical study, speakers, arts activities, and other approaches can expand understanding.

Cultural celebrations can be useful, but anti-racism education should not be limited to holidays, food, or festivals. Students also need opportunities to understand history, institutions, civic participation, discrimination, resistance, and the contributions of different communities throughout the curriculum.

Review curriculum and instructional materials.

Ask:

• Whose histories are included?
• Whose perspectives are missing?
• Are racial and ethnic communities represented only through oppression, conflict, or cultural celebrations?
• Are students learning about the ordinary lives, achievements, ideas, institutions, and contributions of many communities?
• Do instructional materials rely on stereotypes or outdated terminology?

Examine school policies and outcomes.

Schools can review admissions, course placement, discipline, special programs, hiring, promotion, extracurricular activities, family engagement, accessibility, reporting procedures, and other practices for racial disparities or barriers.

Create clear procedures for responding to racist harassment and discrimination.

Students, families, faculty, and staff should know how concerns can be reported, how they will be reviewed, and what protections exist against retaliation.

Include students and families in developing solutions.

Policies are stronger when the people affected by them participate in identifying concerns, developing responses, and evaluating whether conditions improve.

Things You Can Do in Your Neighborhood

Welcome newcomers and communicate that the neighborhood is open to people from different backgrounds.

Neighborhood organizations can provide information about local services, meetings, schools, transportation, recreation, emergency resources, and opportunities to participate.

Welcoming efforts should be voluntary and respectful of privacy. New residents should not feel required to explain their race, ethnicity, religion, immigration experience, or other personal information in order to belong.

Create opportunities for neighbors to know one another.

Community meals, recreation, neighborhood meetings, cultural events, public-space projects, gardens, cleanups, arts activities, and other shared experiences can create opportunities for relationships across racial and ethnic differences.

Interaction can be valuable, but contact alone does not eliminate prejudice. The quality of the interaction, the surrounding power relationships, and how people are treated also matter.

Review housing and neighborhood policies for discrimination or exclusion.

Examine whether lending, real-estate practices, rental policies, homeowners' associations, zoning, neighborhood organizations, public investment, or other institutions create or maintain racial barriers.

Housing discrimination may involve steering, unequal treatment, discriminatory advertising, lending practices, appraisal practices, or other barriers. Communities should use current legal and housing resources when addressing a specific concern.

Organize residents and relevant professionals when a pattern needs investigation.

Depending on the issue, a working group might include residents, tenant organizations, fair-housing organizations, legal professionals, housing organizations, lenders, real-estate professionals, local government, researchers, and others with relevant knowledge.

Neighborhood associations should also consider who participates in meetings and leadership and whether meeting times, language, accessibility, communication methods, or organizational culture create barriers.

Things You Can Do in Your Community

Respond visibly to racist harassment, vandalism, or violence.

When racist graffiti or other hateful material appears, communities can document it, report it through appropriate channels, support people targeted by it, and arrange removal when authorized.

Public art, vigils, educational events, community statements, or other activities may also communicate community values.

Build cross-sector partnerships to examine institutional practices.

Community coalitions may include residents, civil-rights organizations, schools, businesses, health organizations, housing organizations, media, public agencies, faith communities, youth organizations, and others.

Coalitions should include people directly affected by racial inequities and should not rely only on institutional leaders to define the problem.

Areas for review might include:

• Hiring and contracting
• Housing and land use
• Education
• Transportation
• Environmental conditions
• Health and human services
• Public safety
• Civic participation
• Language access
• Public investment

Expand participation in civic leadership.

Candidate forums, voter education, voter registration, leadership-development programs, public boards and commissions, youth civic programs, and other activities can help residents participate more fully in public life.

Communities can also examine whether appointment, election, recruitment, or meeting processes create unnecessary barriers for racial or ethnic groups that have been underrepresented.

Hold community forums, listening sessions, or other opportunities to discuss racism.

These activities can help residents describe experiences, identify priorities, discuss disagreements, connect with others, and develop possible actions.

Skilled facilitation may be helpful, particularly when participants have experienced harm or when significant conflict exists.

Forums should connect with follow-up action. Asking people to repeatedly describe experiences of discrimination without changing conditions can create frustration and reduce trust.

Develop a long-term community strategy.

A sustained strategy may involve local government, community organizations, businesses, schools, health systems, media, housing organizations, and other institutions.

Each participating institution can identify:

• Where racial inequities appear in its own work
• Which policies or practices should be reviewed
• Who should participate in that review
• What changes will be implemented
• How progress will be measured
• How the organization will remain accountable over time

Support community-led cultural events and institutions.

Festivals, museums, arts programs, cultural organizations, historical projects, language programs, and other community activities can contribute to cultural pride, relationships, and public understanding.

Support should reflect the priorities of the communities organizing the activities rather than treating culture as entertainment for outsiders.

Use peaceful civic action when appropriate.

Vigils, demonstrations, rallies, petitions, public comments, community meetings, and other lawful forms of civic participation may be appropriate responses to racist incidents, discriminatory policies, or institutional inaction.

Organizers should consider the goals, people affected, safety, accessibility, applicable laws, communication, and what follow-up will occur after the event.

Things You Can Do as an Individual

Individuals can also contribute to reducing racial prejudice and racism.

• Respond to racist comments and stereotypes. Depending on the situation, you may question the assumption, provide accurate information, state that the comment is inappropriate, support the person targeted, or use an organizational reporting process.
• Continue learning. Read history, journalism, research, literature, and work created by people from different racial and ethnic communities. Cultural heritage months can provide opportunities for learning, but education should continue throughout the year.
• Examine your workplace, school, organization, or community. Notice who participates, who holds leadership, whose experiences are represented, and whether policies or practices create unequal barriers.
• Help children develop accurate and respectful understandings of race and culture. Provide books, history, art, relationships, and experiences that represent many communities without reducing them to stereotypes or occasional celebrations.
• Build relationships across racial and ethnic differences. Approach people as individuals rather than as representatives of a group.
• Listen when people describe discrimination. Avoid immediately explaining away or debating another person's experience.
• Use your role and influence responsibly. If you participate in hiring, budgeting, education, housing, public policy, media, or other decision-making, examine whether your decisions contribute to equitable access and treatment.
• Support people directly affected by discriminatory policies or incidents. Ask what support would be useful rather than assuming what they need.
• Recognize mistakes and change course. People can learn inaccurate ideas or act on assumptions without intending harm. When that happens, acknowledge the effect, make appropriate corrections, and continue learning.

In Summary

Racial prejudice involves stereotypes, assumptions, or negative judgments based on race or ethnicity. Racism extends beyond individual attitudes to include actions, policies, institutional practices, and systems that create or maintain racial inequity.

Addressing racial prejudice and racism therefore requires more than changing individual attitudes. Communities should also examine how decisions are made, who has access to opportunities and resources, who holds leadership, how discrimination is addressed, and whether policies produce unequal barriers or outcomes.

Effective strategies usually work at several levels. Education and relationships can challenge stereotypes. Inclusive participation can strengthen community decision-making. Organizational reforms can change hiring, promotion, services, curriculum, communication, or complaint procedures. Policy and institutional change can address barriers that individual goodwill alone cannot resolve.

People directly affected by racism should have meaningful roles in defining problems, setting priorities, developing solutions, and evaluating results. No single representative can speak for an entire racial or ethnic community.

Anti-racism work should also avoid treating racial and ethnic communities primarily through experiences of harm. Communities hold histories, institutions, relationships, cultural traditions, expertise, creativity, leadership, and longstanding traditions of organizing and resistance.

Sustainable change requires continued attention. Organizations and communities should monitor progress, respond when discrimination occurs, examine unintended effects, and revise strategies when they are not producing more equitable conditions.

The goal is not simply to create more positive attitudes about racial difference. It is to build communities in which people are treated with dignity, have equitable access to opportunity and participation, and can influence the institutions and decisions that affect their lives.