"Explain or change": the quality and uses of ethnicity data in universities and healthcare organisation in England

Afridi, Asif and Murji, Karim ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7490-7906 (2019) "Explain or change": the quality and uses of ethnicity data in universities and healthcare organisation in England. Social Policy and Administration, 53 (7). pp. 989-1002. ISSN 0144-5596

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Abstract

“Explain or change” was a key term that came into currency in the UK from 2016 onwards to put the onus on public institutions to account for disparities in outcomes on the basis of class, gender, and ethnicity in the main. One of the most prominent outcomes of this policy initiative was the government Race Disparity Audit. This article aims to go behind the headline figures to understand what it means to either “explain” or “change” figures and policies around race/ethnicity in particular. It outlines the findings of a survey and some interviews with staff working in the NHS in London and in universities in England. The findings point to difficulties with the quality of data generated by these organisations, as well as the uses of data. Practitioners feel that data is incomplete and do not provide the routes to policy measures that will make a clear difference to outcomes. At the same time, there is a feeling there is a lack of will to use data to either explain or change their organisation's response to race inequality. Thus, this article concludes that the use of ethnicity data remains the main concern for many participants in this study.

Item Type: Article
Identifier: 10.1111/spol.12501
Additional Information: This is the peer reviewed version of the following article: Afridi, A, Murji, K. “Explain or change”: The quality and uses of ethnicity data in universities and healthcare organisation in England. Soc Policy Admin. 2019; 1– 14. https://doi.org/10.1111/spol.12501, which has been published in final form at https://doi.org/10.1111/spol.12501. This article may be used for non-commercial purposes in accordance with Wiley Terms and Conditions for Use of Self-Archived Versions.
Keywords: Ethnicity data; race; policy; ethnic monitoring; equality
Subjects: Social sciences > Politics
Depositing User: Karim Murji
Date Deposited: 13 Mar 2019 15:35
Last Modified: 06 Feb 2024 15:59
URI: https://repository.uwl.ac.uk/id/eprint/5847

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