Author: Cierra Robson and Ruha Benjamin (Princeton University)

In this paper, we examine the racial dimensions of five recently proposed antitrust bills targeting the tech industry. Racial inequity has always been maintained by formal laws and policies (i.e., de jure discrimination) and informal norms and practices (i.e., de facto discrimination). While the aforementioned bills prevent de jure anti-competitive behavior, they do not completely address de facto discrimination. Drawing upon the concept of opportunity hoarding (Tilley 1998), in which members of privileged social groups monopolize valuable resources to maintain their advantage over subordinated groups, we argue that workplace discrimination stifles opportunities for Black, Indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC) talent within the tech industry and is, therefore, relevant to tech policy debates. To advance racial equity, advocates must address how workplace culture perpetuates opportunity hoarding, and proposed legislation must be combined with systemic efforts to directly address racism in the tech industry.

Author: Seeta Peña Gangadharan (London School of Economics and Political Science)

Changes in our technological infrastructures are deepening inequalities and intensifying systemic racism. As society becomes more reliant on computation-hungry technologies such as cloud or software as services, computational service providers are hollowing out public institutions and diminishing their ability to administer basic democratic duties and to serve populations. For members of marginalized communities, this transformation adds to the challenge of getting the state to adequately address economic disparity, cultural violence, and political power imbalances, further obstructing paths to racial justice and equity. This paper argues that the rise of computational power warrants new ways of demanding racial equity and justice above and beyond familiar interventions focused on equitable access, diversity, and inclusion. To build out this argument, the paper looks at historic ways that race intersects issues of technology governance and identifies blind spots that overlook the outsize influence and wealth of technology companies. The paper then explores Big Computing, differentiating between computational power and the kinds of power associated with networked or platform technologies. Computational power often works around democracy, and its problems encompass more than the typical ones of access, bias, privacy, or free expression. Advocates for racial justice and equity face a unique opportunity to lead debate on computational infrastructure and its broad implications for equity and justice.

Author: Nicol Turner Lee (Brookings Institution)

Structural racism and discrimination have seeped into the aspirations of the digital revolution, perpetuating systemic inequalities against historically marginalized communities and excluding them from the benefits of the online economy. Mass video and data surveillance, algorithmic oppression and biases, and technology companies’ unfettered access to online consumer data perpetuate digital inequities while depriving people of access to opportunity. These realities are worsened by the absence of clear policy guardrails on technology and the lack of current and future interpretability of existing civil and human rights laws. This paper calls for policymakers, industry, and civil society leaders to establish a comprehensive civil rights framework in the digital economy that prevents the regression of progress that historically disadvantaged and other vulnerable populations have made in civil rights.

In September 2022, the Convergence Partnership released the first-ever report to focus exclusively on the funding of narrative change, Funding Narrative Change, An Assessment and Framework. The new report was written by two leading experts in the field, Rinku Sen, executive director of Narrative Initiative, and Mik Moore, principal and founder of Moore + Associates. Narrative change has become a popular focus with growing urgency to change public narratives around issues like racial justice, health equity, abortion rights, and rights for trans people. But because this area of work is relatively new for funders, the work is often siloed, leading to a lack of meaningful results. The report’s authors propose a framework for funders and practitioners to shift narratives via mass culture, mass media, and mass movements.

“We will not make significant change without building all three kinds of narrative power, hopefully operating in concert with each other for maximum impact. Our audiences should not be able to go anywhere without encountering our ideas and stories. That kind of saturation, combined with clear paths to action, will change the environment and make more ambitious policy achievable and enduring.”

It’s a must read for funders and practitioners who want to ensure greater efficacy in their narrative change efforts. 

Nashville’s strong and sustained growth has helped make it Tennessee’s largest city and the state’s biggest economic powerhouse, but racial inequities in the workforce threaten the region’s future prosperity. This report, produced in partnership with the Urban League of Middle Tennessee and Lightcast, with support from JPMorgan Chase, offers a comprehensive look at the racial inequities in workforce outcomes that have long persisted in the Nashville metropolitan region. It also underscores how the Covid-19 pandemic is impacting these dynamics and how automation is projected to affect industries and workers in the area. Our in-depth analysis of disaggregated equity indicators and labor market dynamics found that only about 41 percent of the region’s 915,000 workers hold good jobs, that white workers with only a high school diploma earn higher median wages ($17/hour) than Black workers with an associate’s degree ($16/hour), and that eliminating racial inequities in employment and wages could boost the Nashville economy by $9.5 billion a year. The report concludes with actionable solutions to advance workforce equity across the region, informed by these findings and shaped by local leaders. Download the report.

Media: Here's a Blueprint for How Nashville Can Achieve Workforce Equity (The Tennessean)

January 2022 marked the one-year anniversary of Executive Order 13985, the Biden-Harris Administration’s landmark order on Advancing Racial Equity and Support for Underserved Communities Through the Federal Government, which has resulted in the development of racial equity action plans across 90 federal agencies. The issuance of the executive order last year signaled a promising shift in the federal government’s understanding of its power to realize the aspirations of racial equity and to transform governing systems and structures to become antiracist and equitable. With the order, the administration also affirmed that the federal government has a role, and indeed an imperative, in designing a nation that works for all.

To meet this moment and assist federal agencies in realizing their racial equity aspirations, PolicyLink and Race Forward co-led a Racial Equity Governing Pilot Project with federal agencies in the fall and winter of 2021 and 2022. Building from For Love of Country: A Path for the Federal Government to Advance Racial Equity, which outlined clear actions agencies could consider to further embed racial equity into their work, this report discusses critical elements of these partnership pilots and lessons to inform and support the longer-term aspirations of the federal government to become actively anti-racist. More specifically, this report describes the work that commenced in partnership with agency offices, considers observations and lessons learned along the way, and discusses efforts that must continue at the federal level to fully realize the intentions of the executive order and move this country toward a more racially just future.

Recognizing the inextricable connection between housing and health, made more evident by the COVID-19 pandemic, 19 housing justice leaders were announced as the 2021 cohort of Ambassadors for Health Equity, a venture led by PolicyLink and supported by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. These leaders, who are focused on building political power and housing solutions in Black, Brown and Indigenous communities worked together as a cohort to leverage and learn from each other’s expertise, align around a vision for housing and health equity, and propel their work collectively toward more power in the housing justice movement.

Throughout 2021, these leaders came together (virtually) to share ideas and experiences, forge new alliances, and collaborate around promoting health equity in their work. This narrative report and vision presentation is an outcome of their journey in envisioning a transformative system of housing and justice and reinforces the values and infrastructure needed to achieve this vision of healthy communities.