Does unconscious bias have a place in Decolonising Higher Education?

Short answer: No.

Picture taken from the Tin Men blog.

I assert that the two principles run completely counter to each other. decolonising is about looking at the structures, systems, and processes that have been developed and perpetuated in our society, institutions and minds, that continue the oppression of people who do not fit the mould of whiteness, white superiority, and Eurocentricity. So decolonising looks at intentional actions:

1. Whether it is historical and geographical, looking at the white Europeans who colonised intentionally set up industry, education and societies that were to enforce those colonial ideologies that were to oppress and eradicate the culture of ancestors from indigenous communities,

2. Whether it is current, looking at the ways in which these colonial legacies have been perpetuated and shapes todays existence, or even just identifying what the colonial legacies are.

It would then be improper to assert that unconscious bias can have any place in a decolonising conversation, or in the decolonising action in education.

Unconscious bias makes the assertion that one is not aware, consciously, of how their behaviours and thoughts, influence, and impact negatively on marginalised people. decolonising asserts that the oppressor knows what they are doing and continues to do it, because it works to their advantage. Decolonising teaches that the oppressor will continue to do it despite the pleas, evidence, and rebellion of the oppressed because it provides no benefit to change or empower marginalised people, or to stop the oppression.

Plausible deniability: Plausible deniability is the ability of people, typically senior officials in a formal or informal chain of command, to deny knowledge of or responsibility for any damnable actions committed by members of their organizational hierarchy.

So, as you can see these two principles run, completely counter to each other, both in the foundations of their psychology, but then also in the actions it would take to address the problems that they seek to unravel.

You may have already seen anti-racist practitioners "coming for" unconscious bias because it runs counter to the principles of anti-racism similarly as explained above. Unconscious bias makes the assertion that people who are racist don't always understand they are being racist, don't want to be called out as racist, and don't want to be therefore responsible for their acts of aggression, micro aggression and racism towards people of colour. This runs counter to anti oppression work.

This poses an interesting question for those who categorise decolonising and unconscious bias work under the banner of equality, diversity, and inclusion work.

This poses an interesting dilemma for those who attempt to use unconscious bias as any sort of solution in the context of anti-racism and anti-oppression.