Becoming an Anti-Racist Organization
“We need to reach deeper into who we are and how we work to eliminate injustice not only externally in our world but within our own organization.”
MFSA Racial Audit Report
MFSA Organizational Racial Audit Report
What is our Christian response to injustice?
What is the response of Christians to injustice within their own social justice organizations?
These two questions have been the focus of the work of the Methodist Federation for Social Action (MFSA) for the past two years. They are both significant questions for us to explore. Our work is not complete without addressing both questions.
Over the years, MFSA has encouraged the denomination to live into our Social Creed and the Biblical mandate of Jesus to love God and love neighbors, to respond to issues of injustice both within The United Methodist Church and within society. The chosen issues have often been issues that affect the lives of those without power and privilege, and while MFSA has worked to be a voice for others, we have found ourselves failing to include those voices in decision-making.
“We seek to create loving communities of kinship precisely to counteract mounting lovelessness,
racism, and the cultural disparagement that keeps us apart.”
Greg Boyle, Tattoos of the Heart
Elevating these voices means speaking the truth to power.
Power is alluring and can bring short term satisfaction to those who seek it. However, the deeper meaning of speaking the truth to power is examining reality, accepting the challenges that point to change, and taking action to begin the journey of transformation
Becoming aware, as MFSA, of the voices that are speaking truth to our power, the board has started to hear these voices and has recognized the harm that we have done as an organization. We have not been effectively addressing issues of race as an organization. We addressed racism in superficial ways, recruiting People of Color to the board but ignoring the embedded white-dominant culture of our organization. This resulted in harmful dynamics that caused most of the People of Color to leave the board. We also started to recognize a pattern of behavior resulting in harm to People of Color during high stress situations like General Conference.
MFSA chooses to remain radically Methodist and to live into the traditional class questions of John Wesley: How have we lived since we were last together? As an organization, we find ourselves asking: How have we failed to live into holiness as a Methodist organization? Examining ourselves as an organization has led us to undertake this Organizational Racial Audit. We need to reach deeper into who we are and how we work to eliminate injustice not only externally in our world but within our own organization. In this audit, MFSA seeks to understand more clearly the patterns of white dominance and seeks to begin transforming our organizational structure and culture to be anti-racist.
Methodology
The Racial Audit Team utilized three evaluation tools provided by Crossroads Antiracism Organizing and Training. These tools helped expose common themes and patterns.
Power Matrix: This tool provided a way for the Racial Audit Team to analyze how power might be exercised in the institution in ways that perpetuate racial inequity.
Continuum on Becoming an Antiracist Multicultural Institution: allowed the Racial Audit Team to get a sense of where MFSA currently is relative to its stated commitments to equity, inclusion, diversity, and antiracist values and culture.
Survey: Based on the first two tools, the survey reached out to a to diverse group of people familiar with MFSA.
Historical Background
Since 1907 MFSA has been a champion for justice.
But has it been justice for all?
Recognizing that the answer is no, in 2017 the MFSA board made a commitment to focusing time, energy, and financial resources on dismantling racism.
Knowing that more than an announcement was required, MFSA started the journey to recognize its own part in perpetuating racism in the United Methodist Church and Progressive movement.
This has led to a comprehensive audit of MFSA. Leading to a report of learnings and concrete action steps.
At the end of 2019, after further conversation, an audit team was formed and Crossroads Antiracism Organizing and Training was hired to consult.
Racial Audit Themes
The Racial Audit exposed six key themes about how racism has developed and persists within the Methodist Federation for Social Action.
Themes: MFSA …
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... prioritizes white comfort
MFSA prioritizes white comfort, focusing on “white saviorism” and being “the good white ones”. This behavior results in performative allyship. It commodifies and renders People of Color invisible.
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... functions as an organization of and for white progressives
MFSA functions as an organization of and for white progressives, prioritizing white power and control, which results in a lack of investment in and abdication of responsibility to be accountable to People of Color communities.
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... deflects responsibility by comparing itself to the UMC
MFSA deflects responsibility by comparing itself to the UMC which leads to complacency at times, and at other times self-righteousness. These attitudes insulate MFSA from the critical self-assessment that would lead to the deconstruction of white dominance.
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... structure and cultural norms are white-centered
MFSA’s organizational structure and cultural norms are white-centered which prevents it from recognizing and confronting racism. These structures and norms also cause MFSA to burden and undermine People of Color leaders.
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... works from a scarcity mindset
MFSA’s scarcity mindset draws attention away from advocacy for racial justice and toward practical measures that center organizational preservation and limit its sense of what is possible
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... members tend to operate out of self-righteousness
MFSA members tend to operate out of self-righteousness which results in feeling good about themselves without needing to change, take action, and/or be in an accountable relationship with people of color and people of color communities.
Recommendations
These recommendations are not a checklist to be checked off and forgotten but a transformational shift in MFSA's ways of being. This report is not the conclusion of MFSA’s transformation. It is a roadmap to move us toward transformation. While our audit was focused on white supremacy and racism, we recognize that systems do not exist in a vacuum; therefore, we are also working to dismantle hetero-patriarchy, colonialism, ableism, and all systems of oppression. Our commitment is an intersectional commitment.
All these recommendations are grounded in the commitment that this racial audit work will move MFSA towards the work of dismantling white supremacy within the organization.
Map a way of being…
The first two recommendation areas are centered around a relational organizing model and education and should be seen as foundations from which the other three recommendation areas emerge.
Relational Organizing Model
MFSA will create a Racial Audit Implementation Team that is a diverse group of board and program council members to help lead the work of implementing the audit recommendations.
MFSA will immediately adopt and begin to develop an alternative relational organizing model that moves away from white male dominated targets, the binary view of who is with us and who is against us, transactional relationships, and towards authentic, accountable, and equitable relationships.
MFSA will develop a culture of self evaluation/assessment, feedback, and accountability that is implemented throughout all areas of the organization.
Education
MFSA will continue to educate ourselves on white supremacy, colonialism, cis-hetero-patriarchy, and capitalism and find ways of practicing liberation and interrupting and dismantling these systems of oppression.
Relationships
MFSA will cultivate reciprocal, supportive, and accountable relationships with people of color-led communities within the UMC and beyond. These relationships are the foundation for sustained, shared work for intersectional justice.
Programming
MFSA will increase investment in reciprocal, supportive, and accountable partnerships with organizations of and for People of Color. The relationships and understanding that are generated in this work will strengthen legislative advocacy in its season.
Governance
Reform the organizational structure and cultural norms of MFSA so that it will support people of color leaders and recognize, confront, and interrupt white supremacy and racism.
Read the Report
The MFSA Racial Audit Report is available for download and sharing. Key terms are hyperlinked to a framework document that shares more background on what we mean by these terms.
The Executive Summary is a summary of the key findings of the report.
The full report contains more information and details including analysis and links to our data.
Watch a replay of the one-hour webinar where members of the audit team share about the report and answer questions.
Join us, we cannot do this work alone
This report is a starting place for learning and change, but the implementation is the true work of becoming an anti-racist organization. In order to do this work and do this work well we need you to be a part of this:
Sign up for the newsletter to continue to receive updates and join us as we do a deeper dive into the report for continued learning and reflection.
Share this report widely with your church, annual conference, or district, and encourage others to engage in similar work.
Join MFSA in this work by becoming more active in your chapter if you have a chapter.
