Racism without Racists: A Critical Direction for Social Work Research

Background and Purpose: In an investigation of race and racism in the United States in the 21^st century, Winant (2000) seeks to address the following question: At a time when most state elites claim to oppose discrimination, deny their continuing adherence to racialized views in the populations, and may even claim to be colorblind and differentialist, how and why do racial distinctions endure in such changed circumstances?. Moreover, Bonilla-Silva (2017) demonstrates how racism persists in a society without racists by drawing attention to how implicit biases and colorblindness often render institutional racism invisible thereby failing to recognize the racist systems that perpetually leave People of Color politically, socially, and economically disenfranchised. These studies call for critical investigation into structural racism through the application of critical race theories and methodologies.

Coleman (2011) discusses how social work research lacks consensus in the conceptualization of race and urges for more critical, comprehensive approaches to understanding race and racism within social work. Similarly, Abrams & Moio (2013) and Ortiz & Jani (2013) demonstrate how critical race theory (CRT) may be applied to address structural issues of race relevant on micro, mezzo, and macro levels. At a time when racism persists on institutional levels in often implicit and unconscious ways (e.g. Bonilla-Silva, 2017), it is important for social workers to conduct and engage research that not only point out racial disparities but, more importantly, investigate the various ways racism is patterned and institutionalized throughout society. This study reveals the extent to which this is currently happening in social work research.

Methods: The researchers conducted a discourse analysis of three major social work research journals to examine the extent to which race is investigated from a critical structural perspective in mainstream social work research. The researchers examined the research articles coding for the presence of race variables, types of race variables (i.e. binary vs. structural), the application of a critical race theoretical framework, and the utilization of mixed methods investigating institutional racism on individuals, interactional, organizational, and societal levels.

Results: To date, we have coded a total of 301 articles. Preliminary results show that 30.9% (n=93) include a race variable and only 26.2% of research articles investigate race/racism structurally. Moreover, only 0.66% (n=2) of articles apply critical race theory as a framework for investigating racist outcomes.

Implications: Arguably, racism persists as the most fundamental social issue of the 21^st century and intersects with inequalities in several different social systems such as healthcare, education, criminal justice, employment, and housing. In order to effectively investigate the ways racism is patterned throughout these social systems, social workers must apply critical race theories and utilize critical mixed methodologies. This way, social workers may not only simply demonstrate that racial disparities exist within these various systems, but rather investigate the implicit and unconscious reasons why these inequities persist and develop models of change aimed at breaking exclusionary and discriminatory racist patterns.