Policing mobilities through bio-spatial profiling in New York City

In 2003, the Bloomberg administration launched Operation Impact, a hot-spots policing program which identified high-crime areas in New York City and flooded them with high concentrations of new police officers. These hot-spots, labeled Impact Zones, are sites of mobility constrained and structured by biometric and spatial technologies borrowed from the military. This article analyzes the city's advanced police profiling technologies as they play out within Impact Zones. The profiling is racial, social, biometric, bio-political, and spatial, and works to demarcate dangerous people and places. Because this profiling technology is enacted spatially and governs residents' mobility, I argue for a new conceptual apparatus, which I call bio-spatial profiling. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork in police hot-spots, policy analysis, and textual analysis of media articles, I argue that the lived experience of biospatial profiling is one of pervasive fear which governs mobilities in Impact Zones. Next, I trace the experiences of Northeast Brooklyn residents back to their sources, and find three bio-spatial practices: both biometric and spatial data collection, and police street-stops. These symbiotic practices inform and strengthen each other, congealing to produce fear and immobility for those they target. The article concludes with a discussion of the conflicting understandings of (in)security in Impact Zones that connects the practices with the experiences of bio-spatial profiling, to illuminate the human costs of militarized securitization of domestic urban life.     

The Board of Deputies of British Jews and the initial phase of the Italian Racial Laws: reactions and strategies (1938–1940)

ABSTRACT

This article aims to reconstruct the activities of the Board of Jewish Deputies, the central representative body of British Jewry, in support of the Italian Jews affected by the Fascist Racial Laws of 1938. By analysing the institution’s documents and examining the most widely read Jewish newspaper in the U.K., the Jewish Chronicle, this research investigates how the initial phase of the Italian anti-Semitic campaign was received in Great Britain, and what measures were put in place by British Jewry in their attempts to help the Italian Jews. The Jewish historian, Cecil Roth, played an important role during this phase, in active collaboration with the leadership of the Board and the staff of the Jewish Chronicle, gathering as much information as possible on Italy and its history in order to shed light on the events that were taking place during the first years of the Racial Laws and until the entrance of Italy into WWII (1938–1940). The involvement of certain members of the Foreign Office with links to the Board, and the shared goal of helping Italian Jewry, was also fundamental in this period.     

Reporting oppression: mapping racial prejudice in Anti-Caste and Fraternity, 1888–1895

This paper presents a close reading of the reports of racial oppression that appeared in issues of two periodicals, Anti-Caste and its successor Fraternity, between 1888 and 1895. Edited in Street, Somerset, these periodicals created an extensive political geographical imagination by mapping international cases of racial prejudice. Although critical of the British empire, neither Anti-Caste nor Fraternity demanded the destruction of the British empire. In a tactic similar to that used by early Pan-Africanists, the papers’ narratives desired an end to the expansion of the British empire and an increase in the respect for and conditions of those who were ruled ‘under the British Flag’. However, Anti-Caste’s focus upon racial inequality across the United States as well as the British empire enabled it to create a distinctive critique of racial prejudice across the English-speaking world. Its criticism of the imperial project combined with support for human brotherhood allowed the paper to develop a framework for debates on racial prejudice that drew together criticisms of labour laws in India, the removal of people from their lands in Southern Africa, the racial segregation of public transport in the United States and the restriction of Chinese labour in Australia.     

Journeys to Italian East Africa 1936–1941: narratives of settlement

During the 1930s a huge amount of writing was produced on Italy's imperial activities and colonial possessions. The article centres on the written accounts of journeys to the empire which were made in the wake of its conquest.These texts were written by influential correspondents of the time; by writers of colonial literature; by Fascist ideologues and by occasional, though highly curious, visitors to the empire. All these official and semi-official commentators participated in the rapid settlement of East Africa specifically as observers. The article isolates the different narratives which run through each of the many travel texts: the transition from military to civilian rule,the population of a supposedly empty land surface; the implementation of an empire of work; the translation of Italian culture from the mainland to the colony. It explores the relationship between these paradigmatic narratives of settlement and shows how the vision offered by the travel accounts converged with the institutions and practices of the new empire. The article concludes by analysing the subject positions adopted by Italian men and women within the system of Fascist imperial discourses and some of the ways in which the indigenous population was represented within different narratives of settlement.     

Invisible cities: Geography and the disappearance of 'race' from mortgage-lending data in the USA

Recent scholarship on race and ethnicity has unpacked taken-for-granted categories of difference and the processes of social construction of racialized identities. In the USA, however, legal and policy frameworks established during the Civil Rights struggles of the 1960s and 1970s are based on problematic, reified categories of race and ethnicity. Yet these frameworks have opened limited opportunities for activist challenges, and among the most successful is the community reinvestment movement, a broad alliance of local groups using simple quantitative analysis of public data and strategic essentialist tactics to win major victories against racial discriminatory mortgage lenders. In this paper, we analyse recent trends that have undermined procedures used to collect the racial data used by reinvestment activists, regulators and housing researchers. The second-largest racial/ethnic group among US home loan applicants is now officially known as 'information not provided,' and non-reporting varies widely across different cities. We analyse the causes of this disappearance and its metropolitan contingency, using multivariate models to evaluate theories of consumer choice and lending industry segmentation. The disappearance of race stems primarily from structural changes in housing finance, including the emergence of a new breed of aggressive, high-risk subprime and predatory lenders; but distinctive contextual factors persist in the emergence of a complex urban system of racially 'invisible' homeowners and homebuyers. The erosion of racial data creates an accidental epistemology, threatening the progressive potential of strategic essentialism for activists and scholars while offering none of the emancipatory possibilities of social constructionist theories of race. Les récentes recherches académiques portant sur la race et l'ethnicité ont exploré les différentes facettes de la différence et les processus sociaux de formation d'identités raciales. Toutefois, aux Etats-Unis, les cadres politiques et légaux établis durant les luttes pour les Droits Civils des années 1960 et 1970 se fondent sur des concepts de race et ethnicité réifiés; ce sont pourtant ces cadres qui ont ouvert la voie à la critique des activistes. Parmi ces critiques, le mouvement de réinvestissement communautaire est celui qui a connu le plus grand succès. Ce mouvement était composé d'une large alliance entre divers groupes locaux utilisant une analyse simple de données publiques quantitatives ainsi que des stratégies d'essentialisme tactique. Ces moyens ont servi à remporter d'importantes victoires contre le racisme des prêteurs hypothécaires. Dans cet article, nous analysons certaines tendences récentes qui ont menacé les procédures de collecte des données raciales par les activistes du réinvestissement, régulateurs, et chercheurs. Le deuxième plus grand groupe racial/ ethnique chez les demandeurs de prêts hypothécaires aux E.U. est maintenant connu officiellement sous la rubrique 'information non-fournie' et le fait de ne pas indiquer sa race ou ethnicité varie énormément d'une ville à l'autre. Nous analysons les causes de ce manque d'information ainsi que son contexte métropolitain à l'aide de différents modèles d'évaluation du choix des consommateurs et de la segmentation de l'industrie du prêt. La disparition d'information ayant trait à la race est principalement issue de changements structuraux dans le financement immobilier, incluant l'émergence d'un nouveau groupe de prêteurs agressifs, prédateurs et à haut risque. Par contre, certains facteurs contextuels distincts persistent dans l'émergence d'un système urbain complexe de propriétaires et acheteurs dont la race demeure 'invisible'. L'érosion de données raciales crée une épistémologie accidentelle et menace le potentiel progressiste de l'essentialisme stratégique utilisé par les activistes et les chercheurs sans toutefois offrir les possibilités émancipatoires des théories raciales constructivistes. Reciente erudición sobre raza e identidad étnica ha deshecho las aceptadas categorías de diferencia y también los procesos de la construcción social de identidades basadas en raza. Sin embargo, en los Estados Unidos, los marcos legales y políticos que fueron establecidos durante la lucha por Derechos Civiles en los años 60 y 70 se fundan en categorías de raza e identidad étnica que son problemáticas y sustancializadas. Y, no obstante, estos marcos han abierto limitadas oportunidades por los desafíos de activistas, y entre los más exitosos es el movimiento de reinversión comunitaria, una extensa alianza de grupos locales que utilizan un sencillo análisis cuantitativo de datos públicos y tácticos estratégicos esencialitas para ganar victorias importantes contra los prestamistas de hipotecas que discriminan por motivos racistas. En este papel, analizamos recientes tendencias que han arruinado los procedimientos implementados para recoger datos raciales utilizados por los activistas reinversionistas, reguladores, e investigadores de viviendas. Hoy en día, el segundo grupo racial/étnica más grande de solicitantes de hipotecas en los Estados Unidos es oficialmente conocido como 'información no proporcionada' y este no revelación de información varia bastante en las varias ciudades. Analizamos las causas de esta desaparición y su contingencia metropolitana por el empleo de modelos multivarios para evaluar teorías de opciones para consumidores y la segmentación de la industria de préstamos. La desaparición de raza viene principalmente de los cambios estructurales en la financiación de viviendas, incluso la emergencia de nuevos prestamistas agresivos y predadores; pero factores contextuales distintivos persisten en la emergencia de un complejo sistema urbano de propietarios y compradores de viviendas racialmente 'invisibles'. La erosión de datos sobre raza crea una epistemología accidental que amenaza el potencial progresivo de esencialismo estratégico para activistas y eruditos y que no ofrece ninguna de las posibilidades emancipadoras de las teorías de construccionismo social sobre raza.     

The persistence of white ethnicity in New England politics

There was a consensus among earlier students of New England politics that the political influence of European ancestry was fading by the latter half of the 20th century. We examine this proposition in recent times by exploring the role of ethnic ancestry in explaining the political divide in the region's presidential voting in over 1500 New England towns. Contrary to earlier predictions, ethnic origin does retain some explanatory power in models of recent voting behavior, and ethnic cleavages have not been entirely replaced by economic divisions in the electorate. Although the settlement patterns of the more established and numerous nationality groups (i.e. Irish and Italians) are less associated with partisanship than they were 50 years ago, the political salience of white ethnicity persists, suggesting that ethnic groups do not simply dealign or politically “assimilate” over time. Some groups maintain a strong identity in spite of upward mobility because movement from city to suburbs is selected not just on housing, income or school characteristics, as is usually the case, but on ethnicity too. Towns with significant concentrations of specific European ancestry groups lean Republican, even after we have accounted for the presence of other sources of political leaning and past voting tendencies, while Democratic attachments are undeniably strong in towns where the newer immigrant groups have settled. The “new ethnicity” (i.e. racial minorities) and the “old ethnicity” (i.e. white ethnics) clearly carry distinct political implications for this region's presidential politics.     

A racial triangle: physical anthropology and race theories between Germans,Jews and Poles

The last decades of the nineteenth century saw a growing prominence of German racial sciences. This article documents how East Central European scholars responded to their potential marginalization within the scientific community due to German racial theories in the field of physical anthropology and the popularization of science. Three personalities represent a sample of this variety: Ludwik Gumplowicz, a Polish-Jewish sociologist; Mateusz Mieses, a Galician Jewish amateur anthropologist; and Jan Czekanowski, professor of anthropology and spiritus rector of the Lwów school of anthropology. All three cases illustrate the contradictions inscribed into the concept of transnationalism. To varying extents, they belonged to the German-speaking scientific community, through which they gained access to international science. Their reactions to anti-Jewish and anti-Slavic positions among the dominant racial theories of their time shines light on the tensions which were present within the academic community, as well as on the tensions that appeared between their own (semi-)professional status, self-perception and their group identities. The international communication and contacts came into conflict with the exclusionary philosophy of racial theories, thus perpetually challenging their transnational position. The responses of these actors sought to redefine spatial and methodological frameworks amid the dominant discourses. Each making attempts in their own way, they aimed at reversing what they perceived as aberrations of racial theories while persistently remaining within this discourse.     

The Legacy of Greece

This article compares two radically opposed views concerning “race” in the first half of the 20th century: the one of Franz Boas (1858–1942), the founder of American cultural anthropology, and the other of Hans F.K. Günther (1889–1968), the most widely read theoretician of race in Nazi Germany. Opposite as their views were, both derived from a similar non-evolutionist German anthropological matrix. The article reconstructs their definitions of racial objects and studies their analyses of racial intermixture. Although both believed that contemporary peoples were racially deeply mixed, Boas moved towards an antiracist conception of race-as-population, whereas Günther moved towards a racist conception of homogenous races in mixed peoples. The comparison shows that the major difference between them concerns their ideals or guiding principles. Their respective ideals seeped into their versions of science and transformed the nature and the significance of their respective ideas.     

Free speech,toleration and equal respect: the Bolt affair in context

It is a rare moment when free speech becomes a potent political issue within the Australian polity. But the Andrew Bolt affair, the Abbott government's subsequent move to repeal §18C of the Racial Discrimination Act 1975 (Cth), and its ultimate abandonment of this reform, is one of those moments. This article seeks to place these political events in a broader political and philosophical context, investigating how the conflicts and tensions to which these events gave rise can be understood in terms of competing perspectives within a wider liberal tradition, producing rival imperatives centred on free speech and equal respect. The differing priorities which these competing liberal perspectives placed on free speech and equal respect give rise to two very different conceptions of toleration, and its application within liberal democracies.     

Hate-crimes as racial violence: a critique of the exceptional

Violence on the one hand is taken as something natural and normal. On the other hand, certain violent actions, such as hate-crimes, are portrayed as forms of exceptional violence, while systemic inequalities are rendered ordinary. In this paper, I de-naturalize the concept of violence through a critical evaluation of hate-crimes. I argue that the concept of hate-crimes has been, or is at risk, of being co-opted by a more sustained effort to ignore and downplay racial inequalities in society. Drawing on the philosophical distinction between ‘killing’ and ‘letting die’, I contend that an exclusive focus on individual-based hate-crimes deflects attention from the systemic, structural inequalities of society; and that a narrow conceptualization of violence (as direct, intentional action) conforms to a more expansive neoliberal promotion of a ‘race-blind’ or ‘colour-blind’ criminal justice system.