Episode 7: Privilege and Power in Higher Education, Science, and Medicine

Privilege

• Certain dimensions in society define the categories to which people belong, e.g. gender, wealth, socioeconomic status. For example, having more financial wealth can place a person on top of the “coin” (in the coin model of privilege). [3]
• For some people, they are born into the space on top of the coin, and others are born into the space below it and have to earn their way to the top of the coin.
• With privilege comes entitlement, even in academia. How one recognizes their own privilege and how it can be influential.
• The goal is to use influence for good. Dr. Busari strongly believes in using his own position to advance diversity, equity, and inclusion, especially in academia and higher education.

Advice on how to advocate for a just system: [4]

• Identification and representation in the top tiers of science and education can demonstrate visibility of scientists and academics who “look like me.”
• For example, more than half of graduates from Dutch universities are women. In a report from the Dutch Network of Women Professors, 1 in 4 full professors in the Netherlands are women [5]. However, there are no data available to show what proportion of professors are of underrepresented or minoritized backgrounds.
• Selection procedures need to be equitable and also account for intersectionality of those who are selecting (e.g. new hirees, trainees, etc).

Six ways to be an ally: [7]

• Being: Create safe spaces.
• Knowing: Educate yourself. (Also be mindful of the minority tax.)
• Feeling: Acknowledge your feelings. (White privilege is a part of these feelings.)
• Doing: Recognize and address microaggressions.
• Promoting: Promote diversity in your spheres of influence.
• Acting: Actively dismantle racist structures.

References from this episode: and Additional Reading

1. Diversity matters: the other doctor within the Dutch academic healthcare system
2. Health professionals for a new century: transforming education to strengthen health systems in an interdependent world
3. The coin model of privilege and critical allyship: implications for health
4. Academic Medicine Special Issue: Addressing Harmful Bias and Eliminating Discrimination in Health Professions Learning Environments
5. LNVH: Women Professors Monitor 2021
6. Ten minutes with Jamiu Busari
7. Six ways to get a grip by calling-out racism and enacting allyship in medical education

Definitions/ Glossary:

Some of these definitions have been adapted from racialequitytools.org/glossary:

• Privilege is an unearned advantage, entitlement, or benefit that result from an individual characteristic (e.g. white privilege) or systemic structures that propagate such privilege based on individual characteristics.
• Power can be considered the ability to influence others and impose one’s beliefs. Power is unequally distributed and can permit those who have power greater access and control over resources.
• White fragility is a state in which racial stress can trigger defensiveness, shame, guilt, and/or anger; the term “white fragility” has been given to those who have difficulties in talking about racism.
• Intersectionality refers to one’s multiple identities and can help to clarify the ways a person can simultaneously experience privilege and oppression.
• Microaggressions are everyday statements and/or actions directed towards traditionally marginalized groups that act as indirect, subtle, and unintentional discrimination.
• Minority tax refers to the added responsibility given to those who belong to minoritized groups and who are made responsible for making change happen. They may be asked by those with privilege to do the work of educating them about the experiences of being minoritized or making the structural and systemic changes needed to address issues like those listed above.

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