On the edge of diversity: Anti-Muslim racism and discrimination in white diversity spaces

Abstract

This article traces the development over the last decades in France of anti-Muslim racism and discrimination within professional and organisational fields. It shows how, in the wake of 2004 law banning religious symbols in schools, new demands for religious neutrality have spread far beyond educational grounds, to permeate a variety of institutions, including those purportedly designed to fight against discrimination and achieve equality. Drawing on a longitudinal, qualitative analysis of workplace diversity policies, I show the eviction of faith diversity from corporate diversity procedures through the implementation of ‘white diversity’ concepts, based on two tenets: first, patterns of Muslim racialisation, as faith options are turned into ‘personality styles’ and ‘identity problems’; second, the perceived legitimacy and widespread social acceptance of this ‘respectable racism’, woven into claims upon meritocracy, and disguised as ‘corporate culture’.