From covert to overt: the role of crisis in transforming racism

Over the last few decades community awareness and social pressure have ensured that overt racism and racist actions have become relatively less in number in many countries across the world. The majority of racism that impacts adversely on individuals and communities today, especially in countries like Australia, is far more subtle, every day and covert, making it very difficult to identify or to challenge. However, this can change dramatically in times of crisis. Crisis in society can be caused by a number of social, political, environmental and economic factors including dramatic and immediate ones like 9/11, or longer term ones like the Global Financial Crisis. They all have significant effects in terms of intense distress within individuals and communities and adverse impacts on people's abilities to cope with life. They also bring out the best and the worst in human responses. On the one hand, environmental disasters like the Brisbane Floods of 2011 were followed by widespread scenes of community solidarity and mutual support. On the other hand, crisis situations like 9/11 were followed by a rapid transformation of covert racism into overt racism and expressed in actions that impacted very adversely on minority groups in society. This paper examines the nature and causes of this transformation and excavates some of its impacts on the community. It further looks at implications of this in terms of developing effective responses to racism in crisis situations.