We need to start addressing the problem of racism in universities

There has been too much complacency at the top of some universities, which refuse to acknowledge the reality of what many of their students of colour have to endure

An online forum claims that more than half of students have witnessed racism at university, and a third have been victims of racism on campus (Getty)

To put things crudely, a British university stuffed full of middle-class professionals and so-called Millennials and Generation Z-ers is the last place where an outbreak of racism might be expected to occur. Indeed many universities, student unions and student societies are more likely still to be criticised for being too right on.

Most stories about varsity life revolve around the zealous pursuit of “political correctness”, securing “safe spaces” and slapping “no platform” bans on extremists (or not) who might come to preach hate. The British academic scene is not renowned for incubating radical neo-fascist attitudes.

And yet it is happening, and it may be more than a few sporadic cases. An online forum claims that more than half of students have witnessed racism at university, and a third have been victims of racism on campus. Indeed, the same survey suggests that the majority of students experiencing racism do not report it.

Such reported incidents that have made it into the public domain vary in their intensity, but none should be dismissed as minor or trivial. It is very difficult for many white people to comprehend how intensely wounding and upsetting the even a single use of a racial epithet can be. When one student complains that he was pelted with a rotten banana during a sports event, then that is one too many.

When others report racist chanting or the use of the N-word, then the time has come to take the matter very seriously indeed. It might also be added that in some universities, left-wing politics has been infected by the same kind of antisemitism that has so badly tarnished the image of the Labour Party in recent times. There is, in other words, no reason to assume that British universities are sanctuaries of tolerance and mutual respect.

The first step might be to understand how the issues arose. One aspect may be that the huge expansion in university numbers makes academe more representative of wider British society than it was in the past, and wider British society is probably more racially discriminatory in its attitudes than colleges traditionally have been – through this can only be a partial explanation.

A further factor may simply be that, with that expansion and (ironically) better educational opportunities for people from the ethnic minorities, more people form those minorities are taking up places in higher education. In which case there is likely to be some increase in racists incidents, simply because the demographics of such institutions are changing. Again, that is only partial explanation, and hardly an excuse, but perhaps some statistical context for what is still a vile trend.

Third, as with wider society, the use and abuse of social media is another factor in both propagating racism and, more valuably, in being able to prove its existence and pursue the perpetrators. As individuals become more confident about reporting these incidents (albeit from low levels) and tangible evidence is more readily available from the digital record and smartphone recordings, then the accusations of racist behaviour will be better founded and, therefore, more likely to succeed in securing justice.

Whatever the reasons, though, and as with the Labour leadership, there has been too much complacency at the top of some universities. Content with their own impeccable credentials, too many vice-chancellors and their staff may take the view that their institutions are modelled in their own image, and simply place themselves in shocked denial when hard evidence emerges to the contrary. Never having to have had much cause to worry about such things, they seem ill-prepared to know what action to take, although the law offers plenty of remedies and they can take their own disciplinary action under university statutes.

It would be too easy to dismiss it all as student “pranks”, high jinks or banter. Even if it were a matter of plain stupidity – not unknown in the student population – the racial dimension of these incidents turns them into more serious matters, towards which no indulgence need be shown. Britain’s academics, no less than their student charges, need an education in how to eradicate campus racism, starting with a few high-profile expulsions.