Structural Racialization
The Kirwan Institute examines how systems and system components are arranged and structured to distribute social meaning, identity, benefits and burdens in particular situations and how these structures can be modified and transformed. The study of Structural Racialization and Systems Thinking is an essential component to all of our other research areas. We believe in order to talk about race, create better opportunities in communities, to improve social justice abroad we must understand structure and systems which race operates in.
The Democratic Merit Project challenges institutions to operationalize “merit” in a way that promotes the conditions necessary for a thriving democracy and to define and use merit as an incentive system to reward those actions that a society values.