For a Diverse and Plural Millenium
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The Multiple Tentacles of Contemporary Racism

Eduardo Tamayo G.

The “incidents of racism, xenophobia, and discrimination” are increasing in such a way that it is valid to ask whether – today at the beginning of the new millenium – we may be facing a generalized phenomenon that crosses almost every dimension of contemporary human interaction, embracing social, economic, cultural, and political spheres.

As the process of the World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia, and Other Related forms of Intolerance, is underway(September 2001 in South Africa), it is important to approach some of the aspects that racial discrimination adopts in the globalization context, and that are related to migratory flows, the environment, and the use of Internet by racist groups.

Migration, Refugees and Racism

One of the characteristic features of globalization is the accelerated increase of migratory flows and forced displacement within and between regions. As the researcher Peter Stalker sustains, "In a world of winners and losers, the losers do not disappear, they simply look for other places".

The economic crisis, poverty, social inequalities, the deterioration of the environment, civil and inter-ethnic wars are some of the factors that push millions of people to look for jobs and better opportunities in the developed countries of Europe, the United States and Japan. To a lesser extent, labor migrations are produced among countries and regions of the North and the South - in Latin America, for example, labor migration from Bolivia, Peru or Ecuador to Argentina and Chile is noteworthy.

The number of individuals living abroad increased from 75 to 120 million from 1965 to 1990, according to the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) data. The number of Latin American migrants to North America and within the region went from 1.5 million in 1960 to 11 million in 1990. It is foreseeable that migratory flows will have increased in the 90's. On the other hand, the number of refugees in the world increased from 17 million in 1991 to 27 million in early 1995, according to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). It is convenient to make a distinction here between migrants and refugees. An individual looking for a job in another country due, primarily, to economic need is considered to be a "migrant"; while a "refugee" is an individual who cannot or does not want to return to his/her country of origin for fear of persecution on the grounds of race, religion, ethnic characteristics, political opinion or because he/she belongs to a certain social group. In the first case, we observe the voluntary decision of the individual, and in the second, the involuntary decision of the individual to protect his/her life.

The images of prosperity and consumption projected by the media on the wealthy North influence the decision to migrate, but the most attractive factor are the high salaries. A study carried out by the International Labor Organization in 1996 of over 500 undocumented Mexicans living in the United States, revealed that in their jobs in Mexico, they earned 31 dollars per week, compared to 278 dollars in the United States, that is, 9 times less.

While the wealthiest countries of the planet proclaim free trade, and capitals and commodities circulate without restriction, they impose increasing obstacles to mobility of individuals. Thus, they not only increase control at the borders to prevent the arrival of migrants and refugees, they also apply control policies on residents (regularization) and policies to deport undocumented migrants. Likewise, the European Union and the United States have built expensive and sophisticated walls in Ceuta and Melilla (Spain) and on the Mexican border to prevent passage of excluded populations to the supposed benefits of globalization.

Many migrants die in the attempt to reach the opulent North: drowned in Rio Bravo or in the coasts of the Mediterranean, dehydrated or starved in the deserts of Arizona and California, frozen in the holds of banana or fishing boats.

Undocumented Latin Americans who try to reach the United States are subject to discriminatory policies attempting against their lives and their human rights, in addition to being victims of violent actions from private groups dedicated to "hunting undocumented migrants". The frequent operations against migrants carried out by the US border police has led migrants to cross the border in less guarded but more dangerous areas, such as the desert and river canals. In 2000, "according to various sources, over 400 migrant workers lost their lives by drowning in the canals and the tributaries of the Colorado and Rio Bravo rivers or due to sunstroke because of the high temperatures in the desert, which reach 50 degrees centigrade, as well as due to car accidents, persecutions, and hypothermia", the Mexican National Commission of Human Rights sustains.

Forced labor, slavery and criminal trafficking in human beings -specially women and children- are increasing with globalization, adopting new and insidious forms, as pointed out by the International Labor Organization (ILO) in the study "Alto al Trabajo Forzado" (2001). Due to various reasons, many women are forced to resort to prostitution as a means of survival or as a source of income. Some do so voluntarily, but others fall prey to criminal networks that recruit, transport and sell women and children across national borders. The points of departure are usually poor countries and, specially, the rural areas, and the points of destination are generally the urban centers of rich countries: Amsterdam, Brussels, Madrid, London, New York, Rome, Sydney, Tokyo. Since the socialist block of Eastern Europe sunk and the inter-ethnic conflicts in the Balkans intensified, vertiginous trafficking in human beings towards Western Europe has been registered. The World Migration Organization estimates around 200,000 to 500,000 women involved in prostitution in European cities.

According to the expert seminar of Asia Pacific in preparation to the World Conference Against Racism, held in Thailand on September 5-7, 2000, three factors have contributed to the problems of migration and trafficking:

1. The benefits of globalization are extremely unequal and have accentuated inequality in the region even further;

2. Globalization has created deep divisions on the grounds of race, gender and class or caste, in addition to contributing to and intensifying a feeling of "manifest deprivation" as compared to others;

3. The process has been accompanied by more restrictive migration and asylum policies in a greater number of developed countries, as well as liberalization policies on manual labor in underdeveloped countries, which has provoked an increase in trafficking in human beings and irregular migration.

Migrants are usually treated using a double standard: on one hand, their labor is necessary to perform hard and underpaid work that nationals do not want to perform; on the other, they are despised and discriminated against. The growing racist and xenophobic hostility against migrants, refugees, asylum seekers and displaced people is expressed in: hostile and violent acts; discrimination in employment, housing, health care, and other aspects of civil society interaction; association of these people with crime and criminality; restriction on the protection of basic and legal human rights.

In Western Europe, intolerance is expressed in the mentality of "Europe the fortress", as well as in laws and policies such as the Shengen Agreement, as sustained by Peter Noble during an expert seminar on "Racism, refugees and multi-ethnic States" held in December, 1999 in Geneva. According to the expert, "Europe the fortress" is characterized by eight elements:

• An entry visa, residence permit or work permit as a previous requirement to be admitted in a country of the European Community.

• Economic and other types of sanctions imposed on airlines that transport passengers without the required papers.

• Open or secret diplomacy addressing the countries of origin with the aim of preventing transit, restricting departures, etc.

• International police cooperation.

• Modification of criminal codes in order to sanction offering aid to asylum seekers through economic donations or facilitating entry or papers.

• Establishment of reception or detention centers for refugees whose unsatisfactory conditions may serve as a dissuading element.

• Use of expressions that create a general atmosphere of suspicion, confusion and ill disposition in public opinion, such as "massive influx", "wave of refugees" or "undocumented", and

• Application of a restrictive policy through denial of entry at the border and issuing expulsion orders, sometimes executed with brutality.

In countries like Spain, where an older population predominates, immigrant labor is one of the factors that make economic prosperity possible. In January 2000, the Spanish press, on the occasion of racist acts against Moroccans in El Ejido, Almeria, reported that this area has been transformed from a desert into an orchard thanks to the cheap and abundant manual labor of Moroccan migrants who work in the greenhouses. In compensation, migrant workers, receive discriminatory treatment and are overexploited by bosses who have become rich in a short period on account of low salaries, clandestine labor, and miserable living conditions which are translated not only into crowded housing, but also into lack of minimum labor and social rights.

The false images that tend to identify Latin Americans ("sudacas") with mobsters, black women with prostitutes, Africans with poor, Muslims with terrorists, are, unfortunately, widely spread. Thus, it is not strange that the police, business and home owners discriminate migrants, based on racist criteria such as physical aspect and skin color. Austrian and German police have been accused of committing abusive acts during repatriation of migrants. In 1999, two people died while they were being deported to their countries of origin, which forced the review of police behavior protocols in these two countries. In the case of Austria, the policemen who were guarding in an airplane a Nigerian migrant who resisted being expelled, quieted him down by covering his mouth with tape, which provoked his death. A Sudanese migrant met a similar end, when German policemen placed a motorcycle helmet on him during take off, in addition to exerting pressure to immobilize him.

Recently, the Swiss press denounced that this country had deported a total of 3000 Africans from its territory to the Ivory Coast. In adopting such measure, they did not take into account the nation of origin, since all of them were expelled to the Ivory Coast (including a migrant from Jamaica), country with which Switzerland held an agreement, stipulating the payment of 500 Swiss Francs (around US$312) for each deportee. To these expenses (around 1 million dollars), one must add other costs, such as hiring private planes for repatriation of the "most problematic individuals", for a total amount of 100,000 Swiss Francs per flight (around US$62,500), according to data revealed by the weekly paper L'Hebdo, on January 20, 2000. It is quite a considerable amount to maintain Africans away from their borders.

Neo Nazis raise their heads

Many migrants are victims of racial hatred and xenophobia, which nowadays are no longer a monopoly of groups of the extreme right, who claim to be one hundred percent white and who beat up Latin American, African, Arab or Asian migrants and burn their shops, houses and meeting spaces. Now the extreme right, increasing the threat to foreign migration, broadens its social base, assumes power in Austria and Italy and achieves electoral progress in other European countries.

In the case of Austria, it is worthwhile remembering the arguments that allowed populist Haider win an important portion of the electorate and assume power. The politician, who had openly expressed his sympathy for the Third Reich, blamed foreigners for being responsible for the unemployment of Austrians. During the electoral campaign, Haider referred to Africans as drug "camels" who corrupt youth, to the Polish as car thieves, to ex Yugoslavians as specialists in violent robberies, to Turks as heroin market organizers, and to Russians as black market and aggression specialists.

United Nations reports show that racism and xenophobia in Germany continue expressing themselves in violent ways. Actions by the extreme right and neo nazis increased in 1998 by 11%, and organizations of this political character, such as Deutsche Volksunion and NPD, increased their membership by 1,700 and 3,000 followers, respectively. Although a specialized police has been created in Germany to control these groups composed mainly of youth from regions with unemployment problems of the ex German Democratic Republic, the phenomenon is far from being eradicated. Likewise, in the United Kingdom, groups of the extreme right are in full swing, with numerous attacks and confrontations with human groups of Asian origin being reported.

In Latin America, the racist international is on the rise in Argentina, Chile, and Uruguay, where their public and underground activities have increased. Apparently supported by nazi criminals seeking refuge after the Second World War, neo-nazis had their first meeting at the La Salle School, in Buenos Aires, in 1998, where they called for the conformation of the international national-socialist party. That year, explosions ascribed to neo-nazis followed by attacks on Jewish businesses and homes, and the profanation of their cemeteries were produced in Montevideo. These events have not yet been clarified.

Two parties of neo-nazi inspiration have been identified in Argentina: the Orden Social Party, led by Iván Franze, who claimed having 7.000 followers in Buenos Aires and its surroundings; and the Party Nacional de los Trabajadores, led by Alejandro Biondini, who says that their objective is to reestablish military power in Argentina and reactivate the military and industrial complex.

Cybernetic Racism

In these times of globalization, the preferred instrument of racial supremacy activists is the Internet. Through the network of networks, they disseminate information and propaganda, they gain followers, plan and encourage racist actions, violating every kind of regulation or control. Through the Internet, German fascist groups have even offered rewards to those who eliminate enemies to their cause.

Although the exact number of racist Web sites is not known, some studies indicate that these have rapidly increased in the past years. In 1995 there was only one Internet site, but in March 1999, 1426 sites were identified and until July 15 1999, that is, only three months later, 2100 racist sites had been identified. Until some 15 years ago, racists were secluded in their homes and knew the risks they would be exposed to if they appeared in public spaces for their proselytist actions. Today, they continue in their homes, but the Internet has allowed them to reactivate, win new followers, raise funds, organize meetings and conventions in Europe, the United States and Latin America. Thanks to this means, the United States extreme right has established contact with similar organizations in Europe, and the movement has acquired international dimensions, a dream which probably not even Hitler imagined.

In several European countries, the dissemination of racist discourses is prohibited and punished by criminal laws, but neo-nazi groups have found the way to avoid these legal obstacles resorting to Internet providers located in the United States, where this type of websites is legal and is protected by the First Amendment of the Constitution, which ensures freedom of expression.

Globalization and racism

In the final instance, the breeding ground in which racism - as a doctrine of racial supremacy - and racial discrimination incubate, is globalization itself and its unfair and exclusionary trends that generate, on the one hand, enormous concentration of economic, political and military power in the Northern industrialized countries; and on the other hand, poverty, hunger and great social conflicts (such as emigration) in the South of the planet. “The architects and beneficiaries of these economic systems are mostly white. Those who suffer them, getting scarce benefits are, mostly, people of diverse races and origins. Global racism and the unfair economic structures of the world are interconnected. Seldom, however, is the racist dimension of the global order recognized”, states the World Council of Churches in the document “Una comprensión del racismo en nuestros días” (1998).

The observations of the ecumenical organization coincide with the report presented to the United Nations Sub-Commission for the Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities, by the expert Oloka-Onyango, in mid-1999. It points out: “In the final instance, globalization is primarily benefiting a small privileged minority, but is marginating a high number of individuals, often wrongly qualified as members of 'inferior classes'. This margination that disproportionately affects colored people, migrants, and women, explains why, even within the globalization processes that have enormously increased the levels of global wealth, there is also a growing pauperization. Differential forces that impel the phenomenon can partially explain this, as well as the increasingly higher incidents of racism, racial discrimination and xenophobia” ("Mundialización en el contexto de aumento de los casos de racismo, discriminación racial y xenofobia”, 1999; quotes translated from the Spanish version).

In this context, we are not just talking of racial discrimination that reproduces itself daily in the individual, family or group spheres, but of institutionalized racism, that although it is expressed in a subtle or hidden way, is present both within many States and in international relationships. “The globalization process may include implicit concepts of racial superiority and discrimination based on a world view that aims at standardizing, dominating or suppressing. An example of this is the case of intellectual property rights that under the auspices of the World Trade Organization, are considered in the Agreement on Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS)”, Oloka-Onyango declares.

Environmental racism

Many governments and private enterprises adopt or omit norms that have negative effects on the environment and harm - intentionally or not - individuals, groups and communities on the basis of race or skin color. This is named “environmental racism”, which is also a modern form of discrimination.

Environmental racism imposes material and human costs: shorter life expectancy, higher rates of infant mortality, greater health expenses, inadequate housing, and a general decrease in the quality of life. It is more evident when Northern countries perform their nuclear experiments in the South of the planet or transport their toxic wastes to poor countries, oftentimes coinciding with where black, indigenous and people of other ethnic origin live. Other forms of discrimination are produced when transnational corporations that extract oil, lumber, and minerals pollute and destroy the natural habitat and culture of indigenous peoples and black communities.

Several claims have been filed in the United Nations on the location of these disposal areas for waste and toxic and dangerous materials in the United States in areas where ethnic minorities live.

The International Legal Group on Human Rights states that in the United States around 28% of the population consists of non-white racial minorities, and that race is the most decisive factor for the location of the commercial toxic waste disposal areas. In addition, the organization provides the following revealing data:

• Three out of five Americans of African origin live in communities where there are uncontrolled toxic waste disposal areas.

• Three of the five largest commercial toxic waste disposal areas are located in communities predominantly inhabited by communities of African or Latin origin; these toxic waste disposal areas represent 40% of the country’s total.

• The survival itself and the culture of the native population are threatened by environmental dangers, such as those derived from uranium mining, while 270.000 immigrant workers of Latin origin suffer every year from poisoning by dangerous insecticides.

Racism in Latin America

Latin American and Caribbean countries are not free either from the scourge of racism, racial discrimination and xenophobia, with indigenous and black people as the most affected.

"Racism is often the reason why indigenous territories are invaded by other groups; racism is also the reason why indigenous peoples are denied access to efficient legal resources. Thus, racism creates a vicious cycle of dispossession, lack of action on the part of public authorities, and new dispossession. Dispossession provokes a situation of extreme poverty among indigenous peoples, which, in its turn, intensifies racism against them", as pointed out by Erica-Irene Daes, who presides the Working Group on Indigenous Populations.

Dispossessed of their lands through discriminatory mechanisms and methods, such as transference of indigenous populations outside their ancestral territories and their later occupation by colonizers; militarization; development projects (including construction of dams) and natural parks, indigenous peoples are among the poorest of the poor, with the lowest levels of income, schooling and health.

Ms. Daes also warns that "the past 10 years of global trade liberalization and the rapid growth of investments in developing countries have aggravated the vicious cycle of racism and dispossession".

In order to attract foreign investment and promote foreign trade, many developing countries have allowed the entrance of mining, forestry and other companies to territories that constitute the last refuge of indigenous peoples and their cultural diversity. Thus, indigenous peoples are collectively sacrificed in order to increase the income of other citizens. Racism against indigenous peoples makes it relatively easy for national political and entrepreneurial leaders to conceive those measures and mobilize broad public support in their favor. If indigenous communities resist dispossession, racism makes it easier for politicians to justify the use of violence to crush protest.

“Until a few years ago in Latin America, it was sustained that there was no racial discrimination, because they only looked at the Constitutions or laws that state that all the citizens are equal and, therefore, there is no racial discrimination. However, what laws or Constitution say is one thing, and the reality lived in Latin America is a very different matter”, as Dr. Luis Valencia Rodriguez stated during a seminar on appeals that victims of racism and racial discrimination can file. Dr. Valencia is a member of the United Nations Committee for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, and in this event, presented a paper on racial discrimination in the economic, social, and cultural spheres. We present a summary below.

Discrimination in housing

Housing is a basic human right and has been the subject not only of many United Nations resolutions, but is also recognized in the Constitutions of many States. However, the realization of this right is still, in many cases, a utopia. Over one thousand million people around the world live in inhuman dumps, and this situation occurs both in the North but primarily in the South of the planet. Those affected by the exclusion of this discrimination are the ethnic minorities, migrant workers, refugees, sexual minorities, people without lands, indigenous communities, the unemployed, the elderly, former criminals. In many cities, racial segregation is not only shown in the conformation of cities and residential areas, a phenomenon that is related to income differences among human groups, but also in the differences of race, color, descent, national or ethnic origin. Frequently, real estate owners refuse to sell or rent to people of other races or ethnic origin, arguing, for example, that their neighborhood will be destroyed, or that their property will have less commercial value. This is observed not only regarding private owners, but also regarding housing administrated by local or municipal authorities.

In Health

As in the case of housing, health is considered as “one of the fundamental human rights of every human being without distinction based on race, religion, political ideology or economic and social condition”. Discrimination in health is expressed in the exclusion from basic services such as drinking water and sewage, and in the lack of healthy, sufficient and adequate food, and of a sound environment. Many medical centers refuse to pay adequate attention to other racial or ethnic human groups, because as they say, their regular patients have no relation with people of those races or ethnic background.

In employment

As a result of the globalization process, States have been questioned as to their fulfillment of the right to work and specially regarding Article 5 of the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination in effect since 1969, that guarantees the “right of every person to work, to free choice of work, to equitable and satisfactory work conditions, to protection against unemployment, to equal pay for equal work, and to an equitable and satisfactory remuneration”.

One of the phenomena that is currently observed is the competition between the local labor force, that wants to maintain its prerogatives, and that of immigrant workers willing to be hired under inferior conditions. In this field, the most frequent discriminatory practices are related to employers' preferences in hiring workers of a certain racial type. Generally, migrant workers (legal or illegal) receive lower salaries than nationals or they work under inferior labor conditions.

In education

Segregation in housing also leads to discrimination in educational centers, because it reduces the contacts between students of the different racial and ethnic groups. Frequently, parents are forced to resort to schools in the territorial circumscriptions where they live, generally of lower academic standards. In addition, there is a trend among certain parents not to send their children to schools that have a high percentage of children of minority groups because they do not want their children to be in contact with children of these minorities. There are also racist contents in some study programs, in school texts, and in information media which constitute a very influential modern instrument in the education of children and youth.

In the cultural field

At the beginning of the new millenium, there still are clubs or other public and private premises, that forbid admission to people of minority racial or ethnic groups. Frequently, these prohibitions are made based on considerations such as dress, personal appearance, language, or other aspects, which constitutes a disguised form of racial discrimination.

Finally, in the cultural field there is still plenty to be done in order that governments will respect cultural expressions and provide the adequate means for the effective participation, in cultural life, of every person without distinction. The right to culture is more evident for ethnic groups, for whom the exercise of their own cultural expressions is essential to preserve their personality and idiosyncrasy.