Towards a Reading of Black Lives Matter in Europe

Abstract

In June 2020, the Parliament of the European Union voted to proclaim 'Black Lives Matter', a statement that also included how it 'strongly condemns the appalling death of George Floyd'. 1 This was a few weeks after Derek Chauvin, a white police officer in Minneapolis, killed George Floyd, a 46 year-old Black American man, by putting his knee on the Floyd's neck until he was no longer breathing. Darnella Frazier, a 17 year-old Black American woman, captured the almost nine minute video of his killing, including Floyd's last words, 'I can't breathe', which has since been shared worldwide.In the immediate wake of Floyd's death, in the midst of a global pandemic which disproportionately affected Black individuals, 2 mass protests and demonstrations occurred proclaiming Black Lives Matter, not just in Minneapolis, but throughout the United States, as well as in much of Europe and the world, including in the United Kingdom, Germany, and Belgium. One example is Assa Traoré, a French activist of Malian origin, who led a massive demonstration outside the High Court in Paris of more 20,000 protestors against police violence, including the death of her own brother, Adama Traoré, by the police four years prior in the banlieue of Beaumont-sur-Oise, for which she and her family have still not received justice (Collins, 2020). This demonstration also invoked Floyd's murder. Several protests signs invoked Black Lives Matter and 'I Can't Breathe', the last words of both Floyd and Adama Traoré. In a later interview with the French magazine, Antidote, Assa said, 'When George Floyd died, that's our brother. They [Floyd and Traoré] died the same way. I recognize myself in Black Lives Matter, we are all Black Lives Matter. Our common issue is racial discrimination. Here as over there, it is the Blacks, the non-whites, who are being killed' (Rhrissi, 2020).Later that same month, I served as panelist and moderator for a virtual panel discussion, 'Do Black Lives Matter in Europe?', for the Council for European Studies in conversation with political scientist Terri Givens and historian Kennetta Hammond Perry. 3 We had over 300 registrants for this webinar, indicating wide interest in this question. The question was not, 'should Black Lives Matter', but rather why and how Black Lives are not seen to matter, and historically seen not to have mattered, in Europe, despite the long and continued presence of Black individuals across the continent.The EU Parliament declaration, as well as protests such as this one in Paris, suggest the relevance and importance of Black Lives Matter in Europe. But what does such a declaration mean in the face of documented racism and discrimination against Black 1 https://www.dw.com/en/eu-declares-black-lives-matter-condemns-racism/a-53878516 2 In fact, Floyd's autopsy revealed that he was positive for COVID-19 (Neuman, 2020). 3 https://councilforeuropeanstudies.org/do-black-lives-matter-in-europe/

Feminismo negro e solidariedade transnacional : a mobilização contra a violência policial em França

“…Yet any discussion of the resonance or relevance of BLM in France must acknowledge how it builds upon previous and long-standing anti-racist mobilizations in France and the rest of Europe. As I have argued elsewhere (Beaman 2021), anti-racist activists in France (as well as the rest of Europe) acknowledge solidarity with BLM amid both similar and different contexts of police violence in Europe. For example, in their analysis of activism by women of color throughout Europe, Emejulu and Bassel (2021) conclude, "The Black Lives Matter movement, rather than being an 'illegitimate' importation of North American race politics to Europe, is a space of mutual exchange, peer learning and dialogue between Black activists across the globe in which ideas, strategies and tactics are shared."…”

Classifying Muslims: Contextualizing Religion and Race in the United Kingdom and Germany

“…We emphasize context here because despite its crucial insights about the U.S. racial system, for the most part the sociological literature on race and Islam/Muslims (e.g., Breen and Meer 2019;Cole 2009;Garner and Selod 2015;Selod and Embrick 2013) fails to account for the formative influence of anti-Jewish/anti-Semitic systems in Europe, as well as the racialized systems that resulted specifically from European colonial rule. That is, racism in Europe has entailed distinctions of both color and religion (the former dominating stratification in British Caribbean colonies and the latter dominating stratification in North African colonies where distinction animated religious-specifically Muslim/Jewish-divides) (Beaman 2017(Beaman , 2021Fanon [1959Fanon [ ] 2004Hall 2017). As Go (2018) has argued, it is important to bring postcolonial theory to bear on the sociology of race in order to account for its at-once highly localized and globally influenced conditions.…”

Confronting Racism of Omission

“…In 2020, the Black Lives Matter movement against racial police violence and the COVID-19 pandemic brought the persistence of ethnic and racial inequalities to the forefront of the public conversation in the United States and abroad (Beaman 2021a;Bonilla-Silva 2022;Shepherd et al, 2020). Yet, the reality of racial inequity continues to stand in sharp contrast to the American public's perception of equality of opportunity (Bobo 2017;Kraus et al, 2017).…”

“…Third, our study takes place as racial inequality is at the forefront of public discourse. Coupled with the Black Lives Matter movement, the COVID-19 pandemic has shed a powerful light on the real ramifications of persisting structural inequities and the harmful impact of colorblind racism (Beaman 2021a;Bonilla-Silva 2022;Bowleg 2020). Economic and medical contingency plans aimed at reducing the impact of COVID-19 have repeatedly overlooked the needs of low-income groups, ignoring the fact that the world's poorest are the most vulnerable to disease due to pre-existing chronic conditions (Ahmed et al, 2020), and especially in the United States, the COVID-19 crisis continues to disproportionately affect low-income Black communities (Kim and Bostwick, 2020).…”