This post was originally published on this site.
In some ways, 2020 seemed like it would be a watershed year for diversity officers. Given the spate of high-profile murders of Black Americans, we witnessed a surge of national empathy. In a short span of time, many college and university leaders within predominantly white institutions (PWIs) rushed to support DEI initiatives. Perhaps you recall the riotous clamor for “courageous” or “fierce conversations” — basically, a hunger for “real talk” about the perils of white supremacy and anti-Blackness in our world. But that brief window closed swiftly.
As early as 2021, we saw the beginnings of the anti-critical race theory (CRT) movement led by far-right politicians who claimed educators sought to indoctrinate students into anti-white racism (note: the data say otherwise). It did not take long for many to feel the unique psychological toll of trying to answer the initial call for change. Facing institutionalized resistance at every turn resulted in feelings of isolation and marginalization, particularly for women, queer-identifying individuals, and people of color in DEI roles.
What we knew then is that, even in a climate of perceived openness, DEI practitioners of color risked more when they adopted a radically candid approach with their white, white-passing, and white-adjacent colleagues in PWIs. That’s always been the case. These workplace interactions require deep cultural work; we can’t simply tack on practices of radical racial honesty when the climate is not ready. The current anti-DEI backlash is evidence of this. It’s a fearsome reminder that we occupy roles that were purposefully designed to run counter to the culture of PWIs, and that we run risks when simply trying to do our jobs.
Earlier this year at the annual conference for the National Association of Diversity Officers in Higher Education (NADOHE), we weren’t surprised to hear that most DEI practitioners have fallen back on their pre-2020 coping mechanisms, including self-silencing, code-switching, and other varieties of what scholar Sara Ahmed has called “institutional passing.” As Ahmed explains in On Being Included: Racism and Diversity in Institutional Life, DEI practitioners must work diligently “in the effort not to stand out or stand apart.” She adds, “you might pass by trying not to be that kind of minority, the one who belabors the point about being a minority.” Why? “You do this in order to survive,” she explains, “to pass through safely, let alone progress.”
But attempts at institutional passing are simply not sustainable. They don’t align with the kind of values-oriented work we do. Instead, they contribute to cognitive distress, marginalization, and isolation. How else do you explain the extremely high turnover rate among DEI practitioners? How do we persist when we are all so publicly under attack?
Enter resilient resistance, defined as the ability to continuously adapt as a strategy to sustain the pressure necessary to influence systemic change. The resistance in question here is not the resistance to change within the organization, but the internalized resistance role played by DEI practitioners in organizations. The concept is borrowed from scientific literature that uses the ideas of resilience and resistance to describe how the natural environment responds to environmental factors (Luthar & Cicchetti, 2000). And it’s a fitting way to consider the adaptive responses of DEI practitioners in this unstable climate.
Resilient resistance is collective, not individual. It is about actively building and nurturing an ecosystem that acts as a foundation and aids individuals working against the system to sustain change efforts. DEI work is fundamentally relational, and belonging to a community of practitioners is critical to our resilience.
Developing networks of people focused on this work creates an interconnectedness that buffers against the fight or flight mechanism these relentless attacks trigger, making us more likely to persist.
What might resilient resistance look like in practice? Here are a few examples:
· When feeling burnt out, stepping away without fear of losing momentum because others are there to take your place while you rest and restore. In this way, momentum is sustained and institutional memory is preserved. Institutionalized positions that move beyond the CDO role to include academic deans for DEI or DEI chairs, task forces, and councils are critical to creating this source of resilient resistance.
· When you wonder if the frustration is worth it, connecting to a sense of responsibility with others through participation in affinity spaces. Employee resource groups focused on your identity or professional networks of individuals working toward change provide access to people who validate your experience and can share suggestions for new ways to adapt.
· When you question if your efforts align with the organization or are routinely excluded from the table when critical decisions are being made, looking to your network for information and access. Cultivating strong relationships with leaders and influencers in different functional areas who can articulate the importance of DEI in spaces where you are not present can multiply your impact and enhance their credibility. In addition, these allies can become an important source of information, alerting you to emerging concerns, providing cover during difficult negotiations, and identifying opportunities for future development.
To be sure, collaborating with amazing thought partners does not make us immune to the vicissitudes of this work, but it reminds us that resilience is a collective endeavor, not an individual pursuit. Once practiced, resilient resistance can allow DEI officers to establish and tap into relational resources. With allies and support systems across campus, we not only nourish our power to resist, but we distill essential values of DEI and disperse that work to other people on campus.
Resilient resistance, then, has the potential to relieve the immense professional and personal burden placed on “the DEI person” and redistribute their work more evenly across the university. When we’re no longer alone in the struggle, we can struggle longer and harder, and that benefits us all.
Dr. Nimisha Barton is a visiting researcher at UC Irvine and a higher education consultant.
Dr. Katherine Penn is vice president and chief diversity and inclusion officer at Bentley University in Waltham, Massachusetts.