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Articles on Structural racism

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The stress of experiencing high levels of community violence harms entire families. skynesher/E+ via Getty Images

Black mothers trapped in unsafe neighborhoods signal the stressful health toll of gun violence in the U.S.

Chronic stress from living with systemic racism and gun violence can lead to increased symptoms of PTSD and depression as well as elevated cortisol levels.
People wait in line for a free morning meal in Los Angeles in April 2020. High and rising inequality is one reason the U.S. ranks badly on some international measures of development. Frederic J. Brown/ AFP via Getty Images

US is becoming a ‘developing country’ on global rankings that measure democracy, inequality

The United States came in 41st worldwide on the UN’s 2022 sustainable development index, down nine spots from last year. A political historian explains the country’s dismal scores.
Black patients are more likely than other racial and ethnic groups to have a biopsy delay of 90 days or more after an abnormal mammogram. Yellow Dog Productions/The Image Bank via Getty Images

Biopsies confirm a breast cancer diagnosis after an abnormal mammogram – but structural racism may lead to lengthy delays

Early detection of breast cancer is critical to improving chances of survival. But racial and ethnic minority patients systematically have delayed diagnoses that reduce the benefits of screening.
Structural and institutional racism account for under-representation in many fields. ZUMA Press, Inc/Alamy

Structural racism: what it is and how it works

After ongoing claims that the UK is devoid of this form of discrimination, what does the term actually mean?
In 1872, John Gast painted ‘American Progress,’ showing trains and roads spreading across the American West. John Gast, Library of Congress via Wikimedia Commons

Infrastructure spending has always involved social engineering

Government investment in roads, railroads and other public services has always involved social programming, both for good and for ill.
The United States has 955 streets named after Martin Luther King Jr.. Katherine Welles/Shutterstock

Neighborhoods with MLK streets are poorer than national average and highly segregated, study reveals

US cities began naming streets in Black neighborhoods for Martin Luther King Jr. after his 1968 assassination. Researchers studying these areas 50 years later found entrenched deprivation.
A congressional staffer opens the boxes containing the Electoral College ballots in January 2017. Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call

Electoral College benefits whiter states, study shows

With a Supreme Court ruling rejecting one of the founders’ two reasons for creating the Electoral College, only one reason remains: racism.
Protesters in São Paulo declare ‘Black Lives Matter’ at a June 7 protest spurred by both U.S. anti-racist protests and the coronavirus’s heavy toll on black Brazilians. Marcello Zambrana/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images

COVID-19 is deadlier for black Brazilians, a legacy of structural racism that dates back to slavery

In Brazil, black COVID-19 patients are dying at higher rates than white patients. Worse housing quality, working conditions and health care help to explain the pandemic’s racially disparate toll.

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