Twenty-fourth International Conference on Diversity in Organizations, Communities & Nations

Abstract

Many in the multi-ethnic Evangelical Christian (MEC) movement implicitly embrace the Contact Hypothesis. People in these spaces assume that the act of bringing people together across racial and ethnic divides will foster understanding and a sense of kinship. While MECs view themselves as sites for engaging in meaningful dialogue which center on individual experiences of racial injustice, there are barriers that limit their effectiveness and may delegitimize the process in the eyes of key members of the congregation. While prejudice reduction is an admirable goal, it is but one step in a true reckoning with the web of oppression and racial inequalities that influence intergroup behavior. Another dimension of group dynamics that influence the outcomes of the fraught conversations about race and racial (in)justice is not only what is said. What often matters—but is often overlooked in theoretical work on democratic deliberation—is the role of listening. Political theorist Mary Scudder (2020) argues that empathy may be a potential obstacle rather than a mechanism for racial and ethnic inclusion in diverse societies. She argues that inclusion requires conscious “uptake”—clear signals that members of a polity are respected enough to have their voices heard even by those who disagree with them. For many BIPOC members of MECs uptake is not sufficient since they demand concrete action to alleviate racial injustice. Thus, I turn to Chantal Mouffe (1999) and Danielle Allen (2023), who remind us that such concerns must take seriously the underlying power dynamics in the MEC and in the larger society.