Covid, schooling and race in England: a case of necropolitics

ABSTRACT

In this paper, I focus on the UK government’s Covid-19 pandemic response to schooling in England with regards to the impact on race inequality, an area which has received comparatively little attention. I review the existing research, drawing on work by academics, think tanks, lobbying organisations and media reports, conducted between spring 2020 and autumn 2021, and argue that this evidence suggests that the UK government’s pandemic response firstly has increased existing racial disadvantage for Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) pupils in education, and secondly, it has potentially increased the exposure of BAME households to illness and death. I further argue that not only can education policy in response to Covid be considered to be an example of white supremacy, but it is an example of necropolitics, defined as ‘the power and the capacity [of the state] to dictate who may live and who must die’ (Mbembe 2013, 161). I conclude by making some recommendations for wide-reaching social and educational change.

KEYWORDS:

• Covid-19 pandemic
• necropolitics
• racial disadvantage
• white supremacy
• schools policy

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. BAME, (Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic) is a commonly used term to describe racialised minorities in the UK. Although used by those advocating for this population, it is however widely contested for many reasons, not least because it seems to suggest a homogeneity within the population, which may to a certain extent mask the social constructed nature of the term, the heterogeneity of the population, and of the various different structures which shape the lives of individuals. I use this term for the purposes of identifying broad, structural inequalities, while also recognising its fundamental inadequacy, and the fact that the term incorporates an enormously diverse group of people, with different cultural and class backgrounds, but also recognising the lack of satisfactory alternatives.

2. An indicator of deprivation commonly used in education in the UK, although a contested one, which does not cover all types of deprivation, not all those actually living in poverty, for example.

3. “‘Racial literacy’ refers to the capacity of teachers to understand the ways in which race and racisms work in society, and to have the skills, knowledge and confidence to implement that understanding in teaching practice.” (Joseph-Salisbury 2020, 1).