When Stephen Lawrence, a black teenager in London, was stabbed to death in 1993 by what a British court called last week a “gang of racist thugs”, no one expected it to become the most notorious case of justice evaded, leading even to the indictment of the Metropolitan Police by the MacPherson Inquiry as “institutionally racist”.
When Stephen Lawrence, a black teenager in London, was stabbed to death in 1993 by what a British court called last week a “gang of racist thugs”, no one expected it to become the most notorious case of justice evaded, leading even to the indictment of the Metropolitan Police by the MacPherson Inquiry as “institutionally racist”.
Had it not been for Stephen’s indomitable family ¬– particularly his mother Doreen – and their supporters, the conviction of two of his five killers, some 18 years after his death, may never have come to pass.
While the conviction was a triumph for justice, late as it was, questions still remain as to why it took so long, and what we can learn from this case. Would Stephen Lawrence’s murder have been left unresolved for so long had he been white, for instance?
The accusation of institutional racism may have led to changes in policing practices beyond the mere “lessons learned” as the Met insists. There are more police officers of colour in Britain (in Ireland, by comparison, there are only 46 gardaí from immigrant backgrounds) and the Met insists things are different now.
But crucially, the murder happened in a society which sees itself as white and sees people of colour – whether British-born or immigrants – as racialised others. This leads to racial profiling – black and Asian people are stopped and searched much more often than white people, particularly since 9/11 – and to increasingly restrictive immigration regulations (both in Britain and Ireland).
It also leads to the demonisation of migrants and asylum seekers as ‘bogus’, ‘scroungers’ and as ‘taking our jobs’, as British and Irish societies assume whiteness to be the hegemonic norm.
Remember that the recent London riots were sparked off after the Met refused to explain the shooting to death of an unarmed black man, Mark Duggan. And remember too that despite the achievements of black and migrant Britons in the arts and sport, there are not enough black people in leadership positions.
And what about Ireland, where immigrants constitute just 10 per cent of the population and where black and ethnic minority people are not represented in the arts, media, sport and politics?
On Good Friday in 2010, 15-year-old Nigerian boy Toyosi Shitta-bey was murdered near his home in broad daylight. It took the Garda quite some time to pronounce the crime as a racist murder – indeed, immediately after the killing, everyone from the local Tyrrelstown community to religious leaders and politicians were at pains to claim it was not racially motivated.
It took the Garda even longer to bring those accused with his Toyosi’s murder to justice. As it was, the trial was cancelled just before it was due to begin when one of the accused, 40-year-old Frank Barry, was found dead. The Shitta-bey family are still awaiting closure.
The Lawrence family had their closure, but institutional and state racism continues. It does not mean, of course, that all British or Irish people are racist ¬– far from it. But the assumption of whiteness means that these two multicultural societies keep refusing to truly recognise their racial diversity, preferring to project societal problems (such as unemployment) onto immigrants and people of colour.
Dr Ronit Lentin is head of the MPhil in Race, Ethnicity, Conflict at the Department of Sociology at Trinity College Dublin. Her column appears fortnightly in Metro Éireann.
