Intersectionality for diversity

Originally published by Focus Magazine

Diversity and inclusion are two buzz words in any conversation about business, activism, politics, community work and plenty of other topics. They are themes for conferences and strategic plans for virtually all organisations. Research and business cases emphasise that organisations with greater gender and ethnic diversity achieve better performance, but there is still work to be done in achieving equality of opportunities and representation.

According to non-profit business consultancy Catalyst, as at August 2019, 87% of global organisations have at least one woman in a senior management role but only 29% of senior management roles are held by women. Internationally, New Zealand ranks 33rd out of 35 countries with women in senior management roles, according to a recent Grant Thornton study. Although there has been progress, women are still under-represented and the number of women leaders is increasing at a glacial pace. Stats NZ census data highlights the growing ethnic diversity within Aotearoa but it is also exceedingly obvious when stepping out of our front doors that our communities are becoming more multicultural.

However, living in a globalised world and seeing the unique life stories and journeys of different humans, we can see that diversity encapsulates a range of factors that make up an individual and their identities, despite the predominant focuses for diversity being gender equity and ethnic variety.

As an Indian-Sri Lankan-Chinese young woman, who is originally from Malaysia, and who grew up in the Philippines before making my way to Aotearoa at 18, I am included in diversity, not solely because of my gender and ethnic makeup, but because of all the other facets and experiences that intersect to form my identity. My gender and multicultural heritage achieve the diversity tick box but there are many other dimensions to my identity that amplify my ability to contribute to diversity. For example my experiences of spending my adolescence outside of my home country, moving to a new country on my own, making a life here for myself and building a career as a foreigner in a range of industries, being in a hetero inter-racial marriage with a Kiwi man and being a young woman.

When diversity expands to be understood as more than a quota and a few visible factors, we start working towards creating a collective that cross-pollinates a wide range of voices, views and lenses that could work inclusively and cohesively to dismantle bias and implicit discriminations in our decision making and how we perceive the world, thus expanding our views on our reality. We are naturally wired for homogeneity because, historically, we have been exposed to certain patriarchal social constructs and we live with blinders that prevent us from understanding other people’s experiences, continuing a cycle of second-generation bias.

We know that individually we are multidimensional and have unique qualities, abilities, strengths, weaknesses, opinions, experiences and so on. So we need to ultimately remember that other people are also multidimensional and, like us, their identities have a variety of factors and facets that intersect to define themselves. These intersecting aspects of our identities are best understood as intersectionality. Intersectionality, coined by the wonderful Kimberlé Crenshaw (law professor at UCLA and Columbia) in 1989, is the vehicle to understanding the multidimensional nature of who we are, and unpacks the effects of different forms of bias and discrimination that we face based on the factors of our identities (e.g. gender, age, ethnicity, disability, sexuality, language etc.) that intersect and overlap. In the last decade, the term is becoming more commonly used by academics, practitioners, politicians and many different diversity allies to highlight that we are more than just our gender and/or our ethnicities. As such, we need to understand and reflect on our intersectionality to include others’ intersectionality in achieving diversity.

We need to start thinking of our own intersectionality in the actions we practise and the decisions we make by having enough space in our own awareness of our experiences to create safe spaces for someone else’s experiences to hear different voices and stories. We can’t always understand everyone’s experiences but we can learn to understand how people process their realities and experiences through their lenses.

Our intersectionality is like a fingerprint – no one else has the same intersectionality as us. Let’s start having conversations about our intersectionality and listening to others’ intersectionality to hear and appreciate the diverse stories, experiences, skills and views that will benefit and improve our organisations and communities. Let’s work together by bravely acknowledging and understanding the underlying biases and values that drive our decisions and frame our lenses.

So tell me, what is your intersectionality?