Abstract

The implementation of a robust community based participatory research (CBPR) study in Multnomah County, Oregon, has detailed broad and deep racial disparities across 27 institutions and systems. The process of this research has led to the identification of numerous practices that misrepresent and negate the experiences and very identity of communities of color. The research draws from engagement with numerous databases from the Census Bureau, the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, and various administrative databases. The core issues at hand are population undercounts, understudy of the unique characteristics of these communities, inaccuracies in how data are codified and analyzed, and data collection efforts that are infused with white centrism and a colorblindness that renders issues minimized and the experiences of communities of color obscured. Collectively, we analyze this experience to suggest that much conventional policy research while wrapped in a cloak of objectivity is in fact a reproduction of whiteness that renders communities of color invisible, marginalized and misunderstood. The impact of these practices is to extend whiteness into the arena of policy research, and correspondingly extend dynamics of oppression and white centrism. The paper profiles each area of the policy research process that reflects and reinscribes whiteness and concludes with an articulation the reach of such conventional practice and outlines an avenue to reduce the influence of whiteness.

Highlights

  • Whiteness is recognized to pervade many areas of social work practice (Baines, 2007; Dominelli, 2002, Hick, Fook, & Pozzuto, 2005)

  • Turning to other systems for identifying race and ethnicity, we find that while the Census Bureau has stayed away from the “multiracial” category of identity as an avenue to handle identities when one holds more than one race, some other databases have not (the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMSHA) and Oregon’s Kindergarten Teacher Survey are examples)

  • The interactions of the policy research practices featured in this article serve a troubling pattern that render our communities of color undercounted, misinterpreted, and misrepresented

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Summary

Social Policy and Social Work Research

Received April 29th, 2011; revised June 21st, 2011; accepted August 2nd, 2011. The implementation of a robust community based participatory research (CBPR) study in Multnomah County, Oregon, has detailed broad and deep racial disparities across 27 institutions and systems. The core issues at hand are population undercounts, understudy of the unique characteristics of these communities, inaccuracies in how data are codified and analyzed, and data collection efforts that are infused with white centrism and a colorblindness that renders issues minimized and the experiences of communities of color obscured. We analyze this experience to suggest that much conventional policy research while wrapped in a cloak of objectivity is a reproduction of whiteness that renders communities of color invisible, marginalized and misunderstood.

Introduction
Dominant Discourse and White Privilege
Why This Work Matters
Survey Design Issues and How Race and Ethnicity Questions Are Asked
Data Collection Methods
Coding of Data
Representation of Data
Accessibility of Data
Effects of Whiteness in Databases
Findings
Conclusion
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