The Unseen Burden
A response to my critics on why challenging positive ethnic discrimination is an act of solidarity, not sabotage.
For two decades, I’ve been a researcher.
Always, I’ve been Black.
The intersection of those two facts defines my career.
A week ago, on a now-familiar Zoom grid, an early-career academic levied a painful charge against me. Responding to my long-held views on positive ethnic discrimination and affirmative action in modern academia, he accused me of “damaging the careers of your own people.”
To this junior academic, I have heard you. I have sat with your words, and I understand the frustration and protective instinct from which they spring. You see a system rigged against “us” and view any critique of the tools designed to dismantle it as a betrayal. I see the same system, but I fear that some of our chosen tools are backfiring, undermining the very people they are meant to elevate.
My critique of diversity orthodoxy as a betrayal of the cause - first outlined in Times Higher Education in 2020 - is not with the goal of racial equity, but with a strategy I believe is failing us. I am not attacking the community; I am sounding a critical alarm from within it.
To remain silent about the unintended consequences of positive ethnic discrimination is to accept a reality where our successes can be casually dismissed. Consider, for example, the recent report that British politician Kemi Badenoch, MP, claimed that “racist” colleagues accused her of getting the top job because she is Black. That, I contend, is what truly damages careers.
The Corrosive Spectre of Doubt
My 2020 piece was born from a similar experience: the discovery that colleagues questioned whether I’d won a top scientific prize because I “ticked the ethnic diversity box.”
This is the heart of the issue. Well-intentioned race-conscious initiatives can inadvertently foster a perception that merit is secondary to identity. This doesn’t just wound pride; it weaponises doubt. It creates a two-tier system of validation: one for those whose excellence is assumed, and another for those whose excellence must be constantly defended against the suspicion of preferential treatment.
This is the corrosive “net negative” I described in my original piece. It places an additional, invisible burden on minority academics - the burden of proof against an insinuation that would never be levelled at their white peers.
My critics at the time, particularly African American colleagues and social friends, fear that speaking of this provides ammunition to opponents of Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) principles. I fear that ignoring it is a far more dangerous strategy. Flawed systems breed resentment on all sides and prevent us from building something better.
Beyond the 1960s Toolbox: A Call for Rigorous Reform
My call to “think outside the 1960s box of affirmative action” is not a call to surrender. It is a call to arm ourselves with better, more sophisticated tools for a battle that has evolved dramatically. The alternative to blunt positive ethnic discrimination is not inaction. It is a more rigorous, nuanced, and systemic approach focused on dismantling barriers and cultivating excellence.
This means:
1. Structural Reform Over Symbolic Gestures: We must aggressively dismantle unconscious bias through anonymised reviews, mandatory and transparent criteria, and diverse hiring committees trained to recognise excellence in all its forms, regardless of ethnicity.
2. Investing in the Pipeline: True equity means investing heavily in outreach, mentoring, and scholarship at the school and under- and postgraduate level to ensure a larger, stronger cohort of Black students entering academia, equipped to compete on every metric.
3. Championing, Not Tokenising: Instead of awards based on identity, we need a concerted effort to seek out, recognise, and champion the work of minority academics within the mainstream framework of scientific excellence.
A Symbolic Gesture for a Substantive Future
My decision to return my prize was characterised by some colleagues as self-sabotage. I saw it as a symbolic demand for a higher standard. I did it to state, unequivocally, that I value an unassailable reputation for merit above any trophy.
I did it so that future winners, perhaps including you - the junior academic who accused me, would never have to face the same indignity.
The path to true equality is not paved with lowered expectations or perceived shortcuts. It is built on the unshakeable foundation of recognised excellence. To settle for anything less for “our own people” is the deepest betrayal of all.
I am not damaging careers; I am fighting for a future where the careers of all academics, Black or not, is damaged only by a lack of merit, never by a doubt of it.
PS: Thanks for reading. These are difficult conversations, but they are necessary ones. I invite you to join me in building a resilient and truly equitable future—wherever and whoever you are, regardless of your ethnicity