5. Key findings
This section summarises the high-level key findings of the research.
Key Finding 1: Avoiding ‘racism’
Overall, there is a reluctance on the part of government to use the term ‘racism’.
Government preference over the past decade for the use of ‘social cohesion’ has
weakened approaches to anti-racism work. There is a current lack of a systemic
government-led strengths-based, inter-sectional and coordinated approach to
addressing racism in Australian society.
Key Finding 2: Failure to measure impact
Work that is being done is failing to enter public awareness in any meaningful way.
Limited or no monitoring and evaluation means there is little or no impact assessment
of work already being undertaken, including government funded programs run by
community organisations.
Key Finding 3: Blaming the victim
There remains a focus on victims and/or those communities experiencing racism or
racist behaviours to ‘fix the problem’ with little or no focus on the broader community to
address the issue.
Key Finding 4: Ad hoc, disjointed, disconnected and reactive
Government work at all levels appears to be ad-hoc, disjointed, often disconnected from
other similar approaches, and frequently reactive to situations arising domestically or
internationally. Such work is heavily siloed and there is a lack of whole of government
approaches that are not reliant on the Australian Human Rights Commission, as a small
authority, to lead and drive. Lack of coherence and direction across government
agencies and between governments is apparent. This is also the case across sectors
considered in this research – government, nongovernment organisations and academia.
Victoria is an example of where cross-sectoral approaches can work – when academic
experts, government agencies and local councils are aware of and leverage each other’s
experience and expertise.
Key Finding 5: Focus on internal staffing strategies
The most common work across agencies and tiers of government is internally focused in
the form of diversity, equity and inclusion strategies and programs aimed at First
Nations and CALD staff, alongside people living with disability and women. However,
some of this work has been in place for more than a decade and little to no focus is
directly on addressing racism in the workplace - rather, racism is part of an overall
‘basket’ of issues to be considered. Reconciliation Action Plans have the capacity to shift
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