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Mobilising statistical powers for action against discrimination: the case of the United Kingdom *
Author(s) -
StavoDebauge Joan
Publication year - 2005
Publication title -
international social science journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.237
H-Index - 43
eISSN - 1468-2451
pISSN - 0020-8701
DOI - 10.1111/j.0020-8701.2005.00530.x
Subject(s) - distrust , ethnic group , multiculturalism , character (mathematics) , action (physics) , law , sociology , political science , positive economics , economics , physics , geometry , mathematics , quantum mechanics
The article proposes to shed light on the links between anti‐discrimination law, regarded in terms of its implementation and its policy development, and statistics by showing how initial distrust, among researchers as well as among activists and policy makers, gives way to confidence in the apparatus of ethnic and/or racial categories. The article first considers legal provisions and the constraints entailed by their operationalisation, with particular reference to the central character of ethnic monitoring in British anti‐discrimination policy and to the latter's multicultural turn. The author then addresses the justifications and criticisms that accompanied the development of the ethnic categories included in the 1991 and 2001 censuses and contributed to their renewal.