(07/09/2917)
Fight against Afrophobia
General
- Afrophobia is racism and discrimination directed against People of African Descent (PAD/BE). It encompasses racist violence and speech against people of African Descent, but also structural racism including state violence and ethnic profiling, discriminatory migration and border policies, evidence of discriminatory and unequal access in the fields of employment, education, healthcare, housing, political participation.
- It is estimated that approximately 15 million people of African descent live in Europe. There are people of African descent in all EU Member States, recent migrants and long-established communities – Europeans for generations and centuries. However, it is near impossible to provide accurate figures due to the limited data collected on race and ethnicity.
Afrophobia
- Lack of data collection makes it hard to understand the situation of people of African descent in Europe: numbers; instances of discrimination; overlap between PAD European citizens and more recent migrants. Problems with data collection.
- Criminal justice, police brutality and ethnic profiling: reported as an issue particularly in Bulgaria, Cyprus, Estonia, Finland, France, Greece, Germany, the Netherlands, Portugal, Sweden and the United Kingdom.
- Students of African descent face discrimination and exclusion from teachers, counsellors, administrators and other students based on their skin colour, ranging from negative stereotyping to unduly placing Black children in segregated, special and/or vocational education schooling.
- Data trends demonstrate that PAD/BE people systematically have higher unemployment rates than the national average in all countries.
- Under-representation of people of African descent in leading positions in political, public, private and non-profit sectors of society continues to be a barrier to combating racism and exclusion.
- Media disproportionately presents people of African descent in a stereotypical and negative manner, while failing to give accurate, positive and balanced portrayals of people of African descent, and to include historical periods and practices such as enslavement and colonialism.
- Racism has been reported to impact on the health of PAD/BE, particularly mental health (as reported in Germany, the Netherlands and the UK.
- PAD/BE are reported to live in the older parts of urban areas; in poor quality and cramped housing; and face significant discrimination in the private rental market.
- Changes in migration and asylum policies and practices impact both people of African descent who are recent migrants as well as Black Europeans with a migration background.
Requests for action by European Institutions/Member States
- Call for an EU framework encouraging Member States to adopt Action Plans against Racism and Afrophobia.
- Call for EU to promote greater participation of PAD in politics, establish a Minority caucus.
- Call for a European Parliament Resolution on Afrophobia.
- Call for the LIBE Committee to hold a hearing on Afrophobia and lead on an EP resolution on combatting Afrophobia.
- Call for the European Commission to issue recommendations for Member States to collect disaggregated data on race and ethnicity to understand the trends of discrimination in access to healthcare, education, employment, political participation and in terms of treatment by the criminal justice system.
- Call for the European Commission to ensure that employment, education and social inclusion benchmarks –such as the European Semester country analysis- specifically aim for equal access and outcomes for people of African descent in Europe.
- Call for the European Commission to work specifically on employment discrimination against PA.