While this presents an opportunity to leverage what is a largely positive disposition
towards diversity in this country, three key issues arise from our research:
•
Stakeholders engaged in the project were unaware of a clear, national definition
of racism
•
There is no national agenda setting out what success in addressing racism looks
like, and
•
Work continues to focus on communities who experience racism and racist
behaviours, with only limited work aimed at perpetrators – which was identified
as necessary to achieve real progress.
Community sector stakeholders called on the Commission to ‘be brave’ in developing
the Framework and to use it as a mechanism to bring together groups who share
experiences; to be strategic in messaging to go beyond CALD and First Nations peoples
so the broader community can recognise the messages, and to be bold enough to state
what the issues are facing Australian society.
‘One of the problems with anti-racism is that there is no sense of what does success
look like and in what timeframe? So, if you don't want racism to exist in Australia, what
does Australia actually look like? How do we communicate with each other? How do we
talk about our diversity in five years’ time, 10 years’ time (which is what we are) actually
trying to aim for?’33
‘I think, from a government perspective, and I think you've mentioned Scanlon already,
like their research for this year, is, you know, confronting in terms of looking at the
trajectory of social cohesion, but we are buoyed by the response to the questions
around recognition for multiculturalism remaining high, even in that kind of context.
So, for us, we think there's great opportunities in that environment, to look at kind of
progressing and setting up that perspective moving forward, as well as the work
supporting AHRC. Like there (are) complimentary lines of activity and effort happening
now. So, we're hearing messaging around kind of internally within the public service as
well as externally. I do think there's great opportunities for us moving forward. I think it
is a challenging budgetary environment for everyone, as well. So, it's just it's working
through, you know, what are some shorter-term things we can focus on and what's
longer term? Because this isn't a quick (process).’34
AGD OPCAT and Justice Reinvestment work as future levers
While the AGD OPCAT and Justice Reinvestment teams do not have specific remits to
identify and address racism, the nature of the issues they address and their reporting
33
Federal interviewee (Community)
34
Federal interviewee (Departmental)
23