Responding to hate crime: Escalating problems, continued failings

Abstract

The need for fresh responses to hate crime has become all the more apparent at a time when numbers of incidents have risen to record levels, both within the UK and beyond. Despite progress within the domains of scholarship and policy, these escalating levels of hate crimeand the associated increase in tensions, scapegoating and targeted hostility that accompanies such spikes-casts doubt over the effectiveness of existing measures and their capacity to address the needs of hate crime victims. This article draws from extensive fieldwork conducted with more than 2,000 victims of hate crime to illustrate failings in relation to dismantling barriers to reporting, prioritising meaningful engagement with diverse communities and delivering effective criminal justice interventions. It highlights how these failings can exacerbate the sense of distress felt by victims from a diverse range of backgrounds and communities, and calls for urgent action to plug the ever-widening chasm between state-level narratives and victims' lived realities.

Racist Victimization, Legal Estrangement and Resentful Reliance on the Police in Sweden

“…It is also a widespread perception that the police downplay racism or fail to respond to the claims about racist offending with dignity and respect (Chakraborti, 2018;Hardy and Chakraborti, 2020). Some scholars offer practical, concrete guidelines for a more 'effective' policing of hatred, ranging from genuine community engagement and conceptual clarity surrounding hate, hostility and prejudice, to improved education, training and reforms in occupational culture (Chakraborti, 2018;Hall, 2012;Mason and Stanic, 2019). From a more critical standpoint, failure to recognize may also have to do with what Ahmed (2012) defines as 'nonperformative', referring to institutional inertia embodying diversity and inclusion.…”

School Bullying, Perpetration, and Cyberhate: Overlapping Issues

“…In an international context of increasing racism, xenophobia, anti-Semitism, and Islamophobia in Europe (FRA, 2013) and the USA (Potok 2011;Hawdon et al 2015;Lennings et al 2010), social media that facilitates user-generated content can be viewed as a privileged tool for propaganda and victimization. As such, issues of racism and xenophobia have become more prevalent both in "real life" and on the Internet (Blaya 2019;Chakraborti 2018;Corcoran et al 2016;EHRC, 2016;Keipi et al 2016;Williams et al 2020). According to the Council of Europe Committee of Ministers on "hate speech" (Recommendation No.…”

Gypsies’ and Travellers’ lived experience of harm: A critical hate studies perspective

“…‘Critical hate studies’ (James and McBride, 2018) developed as a response to a call by Perry (2006) for greater critical theorizing in hate studies. Further, the perspective grew out of a specific concern that existing critical theorizing (Perry, 2001) was unable to explain the breadth of hate behaviours in society that were both extreme and ‘everyday’ (Essed, 1991; Iganski, 2008) and have been exacerbated by the failure of agencies to implement joined-up, effective responses to bias-motivated behaviours (Chakraborti, 2018; HMICFRS, 2018). Perry’s (2001) work within hate studies has been seminal and has arguably provided the critical backbone to research in this area (Hall, 2015).…”