In an article for the Every Child Journal, Sioned Churchill sets out the findings from the Trust for London Preventing Racist Violence Special Initiative. As part of the initiative three groups were funded to get greater insight into racist violence and to develop new preventative approaches. The groups worked in both schools and communities over a period of six years.
The conclusions drawn from the Special Initiative – set out in the article – challenge the prevailing practice of ‘zero tolerance’ as an adequate response to tackling racism in work with young people (e.g. by teachers excluding pupils for such behaviour) as it fails to address the underlying causes of their attitudes and behaviour.
The article also argues that there is little reason to believe that reactive and repressive responses will bring about the necessary change and that a more proactive and preventative approach is needed.
20 November 2012