Institutional Racism

Institutional Racism explores the role of colonialism, truth, and knowledge in creating and maintaining institutional racism. It documents how the manipulation of truth and knowledge facilitated colonialism and epistemicide to create a perpetrator perspective of institutional racism that maintains the illusionary status of equality and justice and continues to conceal the breadth and depth of victimisation.

The chapters present an understanding of how epistemicide, critical race theory, post-colonialism, white racial frames, white privilege, and insidious trauma can be used to critique the discourses and mechanisms that sustain a perpetrator perspective of institutional racism and how these concepts facilitate a victim perspective of institutional racism that documents the cumulative psychological and physical harms of institutional racism. The second half of the book provides grounded case studies of institutional racism in the areas of education, policing, the war on terror, and Covid 19 to demonstrate how contemporary processes of colonialism and epistemicide maintain and reinforce institutional racism to negatively impact physical and mental health and contribute to cumulative trauma.

This book will be of great interest to students and scholars of criminology, sociology, criminal justice, history, law, and politics, and those studying race, ethnicity, and racism, as well as anyone interested in learning about racism, structural inequality, and institutional racism.

Shamila Ahmed is an interdisciplinary academic who uses the disciplines of law, criminology, international relations, social policy, political science, and psychology to provide understandings of the impact of structures, institutions, and discourses on individuals’ perceptions, beliefs, values, and experiences. Her work focuses on positively impacting laws, policies, and institutions to reduce inequalities, injustice and discrimination.