highlight the intersection of identities and the dynamics of power, privilege, and oppression that influence the counseling relationship. The domains reflect the different factors that lead to multicultural and social justice competence: awareness, client worldview, counseling relationship, counseling, and advocacy interventions (Ratts et al., 2015). See Box 3 for social justice scholars.
Defining Antiracism
The beauty of antiracism is that you don’t have to pretend to be free of racism to be an antiracist. Antiracism is the commitment to fight racism wherever you find it, including in yourself. And it’s the only way forward.
—Ijeoma Oluo
Recently, literature about racism and antiracism—like Ijeoma Oluo’s So You Want to Talk About Race, Ibram Kendi’s How to Be an Antiracist, and Robin DiAngelo’s White Fragility—has risen to the top of the New York Times best sellers list. But what is antiracism? Simply put, being antiracist refers to taking an active approach to dismantling racist practices, racial hatred, systemic racism, and the oppression of historically oppressed racial groups. In Britain, antiracism evolved as a critique of the multicultural education movement, which some believed accepted deficit perspectives of Black and Brown students and ignored the systems and policies that resulted in uneven student outcomes (Gillborn, 2006). Thus, antiracism in education focuses on the dominant systems that uphold racist views and ideas, like standardized testing, curriculum, educator preparation, discipline, and other schooling policies that disproportionately impact Black and Brown communities.
Although there is a plethora of literature on the history of slavery in the United States and on movements against slavery (e.g., abolition), there is a lack of literature describing the history of antiracist thought. William Lloyd Garrison emerged as a prominent abolitionist and early antiracist. Garrison founded the newspaper The Liberator and the American Anti-Slavery Society. Initially fearful of integrating former slaves into white society, Garrison later talked about his flawed thinking, openly discussed the horrors of slavery, and advocated for abolition.
Herbert Aptheker (1992), a historian and controversial political activist, wrote one of the few U.S. books to use antiracism as a construct before the 2000s. The book, titled Anti-Racism in U.S. History: The First Two Hundred Years, challenged the view that whites universally accepted racism. Aptheker attempted to debunk the myth that white people never cared about the plight of African Americans until just before the outbreak of the Civil War.
Angela Davis, a feminist and political activist, has written extensively about antiracism and more specifically the idea that antiracism must disrupt the social constructions of both race and gender (Davis, 1981, 1985). For many years, Davis has argued that racism, sexism, capitalism, and heterosexism work together to compound oppression. Her famous quote “In a racist society it is not enough to be nonracist, we must be antiracist” has become popular and is a defining aspect of today’s conceptualization of antiracism.
Other Forms of Racism
Anti-Black racism is typically characterized as prejudice and bias that is directed at people of African descent. At the core of anti-Blackness is a devaluation and marginalization of Black people through policies and practices, such as continued overpolicing in Black communities, the criminalization of Black children, and brutality against Black people in general. Colorism, a type of discrimination in which lighter skin is privileged over darker skin, is aligned with the concept of anti-Black racism. Non-Black people with dark skin, such as Native Americans or darker Cuban Americans, are often faced with anti-Black racism.
The Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement has highlighted the global history of anti-Black racism and simultaneously propelled a national focus on antiracism. BLM, founded in 2013 in response to the killings of unarmed Black people, has become a global movement to eradicate white supremacy and combat anti-Black racism. The popularity of BLM has grown dramatically since 2013. Public opinion on BLM was net negative in 2018 and grew increasingly popular throughout 2019 and 2020. A June 2020 poll found that 67% of adult Americans expressed some support for the BLM movement. This shift in support indicates increased societal understanding of systemic injustices based on race and targeted violence toward Black people. It is essential to recognize that acknowledging that Black lives matter does not negate anyone else’s life or imply that others do not matter. In a society in which the experiences and input of Black and Brown populations are not honored and racist policies are common, counseling professionals must speak out against unjust and racist systems.
The increased incidence of anti-Asian and anti-immigrant racism—fueled in part by former President Donald Trump’s xenophobic response to novel coronavirus and immigration policies—has prompted an outcry among Asian American and immigrant communities, sparking nationwide protests led by the rallying cries “Stop Asian Hate” and “Defund Hate!” Some people still have trouble grasping the idea that Asian Americans can be victims of racism at all, in part because of the myth of the model minority—the narrative that Asians have managed to succeed economically and educationally in the United States, especially in comparison with other racial groups.
Antiracism Is Not Critical Race Theory
In recent years, the concept of antiracism has been used synonymously with critical race theory (CRT), a theory originated by Derrick Bell, a legal scholar who argued that traditional approaches to legal studies lacked the voice and narratives of marginalized persons (Delgado, 1995; Delgado & Stefancic, 2000). Bell described CRT as a form of law that speaks to the social and cultural contexts in which individuals live. Critical race theorists view racism as a normal part of American society that is woven into the fabric of all U.S. systems in such a way that people of all races see it as normal. The dominant strategy of CRT is to unmask and expose racism and racist practices and policies. As a matter of fact, CRT led to the study of microaggressions, subtle insults (verbal, nonverbal, and/or visual) directed toward people of color, often automatically or unconsciously. Antiracism, in contrast, denotes actions to dismantle racist practices, policies, and structures. Following is an excerpt from one of Derrick Bell’s (1995) law review papers explaining how antiracism intersects with CRT:
Critical race theory writing and lecturing is characterized by frequent use of the first person, storytelling, narrative, allegory, interdisciplinary treatment of law, and the unapologetic use of creativity. The work is often disruptive because its commitment to antiracism goes well beyond civil rights, integration, affirmative action, and other liberal measures. This is not to say that critical race theory adherents automatically or uniformly “trash” liberal ideology and method (as many adherents of critical legal studies do). Rather, they are highly suspicious of the liberal agenda, distrust its method, and want to retain what they see as a valuable strain of egalitarianism which may exist despite, and not because of, liberalism. (p. 899)
Antiracism and School/Community Counseling
With the murder of George Floyd coupled with the rise of white supremacist groups (e.g., the Proud Boys, the Aryan Brotherhood), counseling professionals are paying increased attention to issues of racism and are articulating a desire to be antiracist, in particular in school settings (American School Counselor Association [ASCA], 2021). Shifting to antiracist counseling requires more than focusing on multiculturalism, diversity, and inclusion. It involves more than collecting data, reading books by Black authors, and empathizing with Black and Brown clients. Being an antiracist counselor requires interrogating one’s racial consciousness and the impact of one’s behaviors in counseling relationships with Black and Brown students or clients. Counselors must name the importance of the links among race, racism, and counseling. Counseling, in particular school counseling, is a racialized process, given the racist practices and policies that are embedded in schools and communities. Thus, if counselors do not address embedded racist and biased practices and policies in schools, then they are likely to reproduce racial