I wish to make clear from the beginning that I have not observed any signs of racism among the academic and other front-line staff at Heriot-Watt. The research group I worked in was as ethnically diverse as anyone could ask for, with members from four continents and no signs at all of racial or ethnic favouritism being practised.
My complaint is with the central management of Heriot-Watt, in particular its Human Resources office.
Between 2003 and 2005 I was employed by Heriot-Watt, an organization in
Edinburgh, Scotland, that calls itself a university. On at least three
separate occasions the HR department asked me to fill out forms where
I was supposed to disclose my ethnic origin
. Two of these times
happened during the hiring process; the first one I was required to
fill out before even being allowed to apply for a position. I inquired
informally about the purpose of this strange question, but got only a
vague content-less answer. At that time I really needed an income, so I
was not motivated to make too much of a fuss about it. I'm not
particularly proud that I didn't, however.
The last time I was asked the ethnic origin
question was in an
exit interview questionnaire
that was sent to me after I
resigned. That prompted me to set up this page: since I was quitting
anyway I was now free to complain about this appalling practice.
Heriot-Watt likes to describe itself as a university
. However,
a university means, broadly speaking, the temporal organization that
embodies an academic community. An academic community does not care
about the race, creed or ethnicity of people. What matters in an
academic community is the depth, clarity and consistency of one's
thought, rather than the colour of one's skin or the culture one was
raised in. The questionnaires that the Heriot-Watt HR department
kept throwing at me indicate that Heriot-Watt is actually interested
in these completely accidental properties of their staff. That sends
the message that Heriot-Watt has no real aspiration of being a
university, i.e., an academic community.
It is irrelevant and condemnable enough for an employer (especially one that calls itself a university) to ask about the ethnicity of prospective employees, but a closer look at the question I was asked to answer reveals an even more sinister agenda:
| Ethnic Origin: | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| White | Black, Black Scottish Or Black British |
Mixed | |||
| Scottish | Caribbean | ||||
| Other British | African | (Any mixed Background) | |||
| Irish | Any other | ||||
| Any other | |||||
| Please Specify | ..................... | Please Specify | ..................... | Please Specify | ..................... |
| Asian, Asian Scottish Or Asian British |
Other Ethnic Background | ||||
| Indian | |||||
| Pakistani | |||||
| Bangladeshi | |||||
| Chinese | |||||
| Any other | |||||
| Please Specify | ..................... | Please Specify | ..................... | ||
Even though the question purports to be about ethnic
origin,
the main categories are not ethnic at all. White
, Black
and Asian
are races, not ethnicities. It is telling
that an actual cultural identity such as Scottish
needs to be
explicitly split across three of the main DNA-based categories.
I have been told that the reason the question is asked is that the UK government requires employers to keep statistics about the races of their employees. It is hard to believe this (unless I have somehow fallen through a timewarp to an alternate history where the British lost WWII), but even if the government did require this, it would be the moral duty of any true University to protest such a racist policy — and to show this when it asks. For example, the questionnaire could have said:
| The government requires us to give you an opportunity to answer this question [insert reference to law here], but we will not think less of you for declining. Hint, hint. |
Basically, if you comply with a governmental decree of this kind and do
it with the complete absence of signs of regret or opposition that HW
exhibits, then you forfeit the I was just following
orders
defense.
In the beginning of May 2005 I posted a letter to Heriot-Watt's
principal containing essentially the above text. I immediately
received a two-line confirmation that my letter had been received,
with a promise of a fuller response
later. As I write this in
the beginning of August, such a response still has not been
forthcoming.
The silence leaves me with no choice but to assume that the top-level management of Heriot-Watt condones the racist practices of their HR department.
If anybody who reads this has reliable knowledge that the UK government does indeed require employers to ask racist questions of current and prospective employees, and you can substantiate this knowledge with a concrete citation of law, I would like to see it. It would not be fair to criticize Heriot-Watt exclusively if they are in fact acting on behalf of a racist government. On the other I do not want to slander the UK government, which is what it would amount to if I just asserted that they are behind the racist practices without being able to prove the allegation.
henning@makholm.net
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