Systemic Barriers
Transforming DEI efforts from words into action
By Kevin Doyle, EdD
NOTE: This was originally published for the Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation’s monthly Recovery Advocacy Update. If you’d like to receive our advocacy emails, subscribe today.
As many organizations grapple with what is meant by diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) — sometimes adding justice (J), antiracism (A) and/or belonging (B) to that acronym — it strikes me that the concepts and intentions only have real meaning or utility if they are followed by concrete actions. In other words, the real work begins when an organization or entity moves from the theoretical to the actual.
Both the clinical and higher education worlds in which I have spent my career, while often espousing strong DEI values, also include systemic barriers that are in need of questioning or actual dismantling — starting with current criminal background restrictions for employment and admissions requirements for academic programs.
Restrictive criminal background statutes, regulations, and requirements, sometimes referred to as barrier crimes, further perpetuate the idea that people cannot grow, change, recover, or be rehabilitated. Whether an individual has been incarcerated or simply convicted, there is no arguing that the justice system clearly favors those with privilege (race, socioeconomic status, etc.) and is overly punitive toward people of color and marginalized groups in general. Whether it be through level of conviction (misdemeanor vs. felony), the adequacy of legal representation (a highly paid attorney vs. court-appointed representation) or outright bias in the courtroom, “equal justice under the law” is far from reality. When past convictions serve as barriers, in some cases permanent ones, to employment, individuals with criminal histories serve permanent sentences even if they have paid their debt to society, as it were, and completed all elements of whatever sentence was imposed. It is in society’s best interest to provide such peopke with appropriate opportunities to become employed, tax-paying citizens, unless there is compelling evidence that they will pose an undue risk to others.
Likewise, higher education, although portrayed as the great equalizer, has long included mechanisms for favoring those with privilege. Advantages in admissions given to those with family members having graduated from an institution (known as “legacy” admissions) are one clear example. The requirement of a bachelor’s degree for admission to a graduate program — regardless of the discipline or the age of the applicant — is another way that people with significant life or work experience are excluded from pursuing a degree that would allow them to apply for professional licensure. In fields such as counseling and social work, for example, an undergraduate degree in an unrelated field like music should not be valued more than decades of relevant work experience in determining who is allowed to pursue a career as a licensed helping professional. And, returning to school to complete general education requirements that go along with an undergraduate degree, just to check a box, when you already have years of work experience, also makes no sense.
It has been said that “the devil is in the details,” and these may be examples of that adage. It is in the details, however, that we move from the abstract concepts that the DEI movement identifies to the concrete steps that are needed to dismantle systemic societal barriers to equity. Such steps, controversial as they may be, are not only desirable but also necessary if we are to transform our DEI efforts from words into action.
Kevin Doyle Ed.D., is the president and CEO of the Hazelden Betty Ford Graduate School of Addiction Studies in Center City, Minn.
