Today’s political and intellectual environment is very different from the one that fostered the rise of institutional racism. The General Assembly of the United Nations (UN) adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948. The French state has stepped up its efforts to combat racism since the 1970s. Although social scientists have shown that diversity is generally tolerated by the majority population, and that second-generation immigrants have integrated well, certain minority groups still suffer noticeably from unequal treatment and discrimination.
We have to admit the failure of anti-racist campaigns between the 1960s and the 1980s, based on scientific research disproving the existence of several “human races”. A multidisciplinary approach between researchers in the life sciences, the humanities and the social sciences has now analyzed the racialist mechanisms operating in racist speeches and practices, and warns against them. Underpinning this approach is a reassertion of the principle that all humans are equal.
