Runnymede: What do you think about race?

How can we end racism for the next generation?

Think Tank Runnymede’s Kamaljeet Gill speaks of a new report launch and invites you to be part of a discussion about the effects of racism in the UK.

Runnymede launches the Generation 3.0 project, with a week-long residence at the Harriet Tubman Bookshop in Birmingham from Monday 24 January 2011. Generation 3.0 sets out to find out how different generations think about race and what we can do to end racism.

In the renovated bookshop we will be screening 70 short films showing local residents, young and old, discussing race and racism in the city. We will host a range of activities and provide tea, cakes and a space to interact with people from across the community.

Our aim is to stimulate conversations between groups: older and younger, Asian, African-Caribbean and white that don’t normally come together to have these conversations. 

Today, Tuesday 25 January 2011, we launch Passing the Baton the report which accompanies the project. We wanted to find out how racism and anti-racism have changed across the three generations that have grown up with mass migration to the UK.

We hope this will show us ways to fight racism so that the fourth can grow up in a country free from such discrimination be it personal or institutional. Runnymede went to Handsworth in particular because the area has a history of racially charged activism and conflict.

Runnymede’s ever first report was Professor Gus John’s controversial Race and the Inner City, which was inspired by the 1969 Handsworth riot.  In the 1980s there were further race riots in the area, and in 2005 Handsworth again erupted into violence between the Asian and African-Caribbean communities. This region therefore represents both great potential and a huge challenge; if we can make headway there we can be confident that we can extend it across the nation.

What we’ve found in our research is that the stereotypes of apathetic and disengaged youth are wide of the mark. The young people we spoke to were active, engaged and impassioned. They had serious and often subtle things to say about how racism affects their lives and their life-chances. However it was clear that while the kids were keen to change things, they also were frustrated because they didn’t see many avenues for them to do so.

They felt that there were few channels to express their concerns and people in power had little interest in listening anyway. Older activists views were often shaped by the experiences and battles of the past and they often lacked appreciation of the complex world younger people inhabit. In this world, identities are fluid and young people play multiple roles everyday; with families at home, friends at school and while looking for work.

What we need are neutral spaces where these groups – older generations and young people - can come together on their own terms to share experiences and offer advice. These spaces won’t solve racism on their own but they could offer fertile grounds for solutions to grow.

It is our hope that for a week the Harriet Tubman bookshop will be one of these, and we would love you to come down and join in.

Kamaljeet Gill is a project assistant for Runnymede.