We changed the laws in 1964 in the US of A — but, too many of us still held onto our beliefs.

Funny things, beliefs.

— they aren’t changed by law. Habits are changed by law — people didn’t voluntarily change their habit of riding freely in cars until the seatbelt law was finally put in place in many places around the world.

— they aren’t changed by evidence. Because, climate change.

— they aren’t changed by force. Insurgents, anyone?

— they aren’t even changed by marketing. As much as the marketers want you to believe they can, it’s always the role of marketing to play clean up or initiator. An important role in spreading changes, but not making them.

How do we change the belief system that supports pervasive racism?

I think it starts with owning up to the failure of commonly accepted methods of eradication such as civil rights legislation, education, protests and that old corporate favourite — diversity training.

And that’s because complying with the law, supporting liberal campuses, allowing protests and even paying for diversity training are…

…the air cover for persistent and pervasive racism.

All of these things have become the polite way to discuss racism in the boardroom, without actually talking about racism or doing anything about its pervasiveness.

When the enemy is visible, the sit-ins/protests/riots are a punch in the gut — they get attention. The speeches then direct their attention to practical solutions, like laws, that will declare the enemy dead.

These laws will eradicate or at least severely limit the visible signs of the enemy.

Unfortunately, as pointed out by Cristina Bicchieri and Hugo Mercier of the University of Pennsylvania, this kind of forced change — using law — when dealing with beliefs is rarely effective. They looked at one of the most ingrained and diabolical beliefs of a culture — Female Genital Mutilation.

The authors found that changing this embedded belief occurred when they identified even stronger beliefs about the importance of family — wishing good health and a happy life for their children. Although it’s still happening, substantial progress is being made. Most of us think this change is because celebrities are talking about it or you can watch a TED talk on the subject.

Turns out, the change on the ground is happening because beliefs are being changed. They assert the following:

For most beliefs the most effective way to change them, and thus eventually change the practices that they support, is through argumentation.

For argumentation to be successful, however, two conditions are required. First, the arguer must be able to rest on a set of explicit beliefs and values that is equally well entrenched in the listener and that is inconsistent with the target belief that we want to change. Second, the belief must not be held mainly because other people hold it as well. —p. 15 of Norms & Beliefs: How Change Occurs

There it is…

…a scientifically based approach for potentially eradicating racism.

the arguer must be able to rest on a set of explicit beliefs and values that is equally well entrenched in the listener and that is inconsistent with the target belief that we want to change.

Think about all the movements of the 20th century or pick any number of examples from history. Most removed the visible issues. Some went further by cutting off the head of the leader and removing the invisible issues — but, racism doesn’t have a leader.

It has a swath of leaders and they appear on nearly every business magazine in the USA.

The white male is not just a category of race, it is an ideology.

I am part of a chorus of writers calling out racism. But, I feel like we are all shouting at clouds. White, puffy clouds floating above us in the sky.

What can be done?

Perhaps we can look to philanthropy for inspiration. The techies and their bankers were sucking up all the wealth and doing nothing but flipping companies before a few of them made it the norm to give their money away — to invest it into society. Now it’s pretty uncool to just hoover up all the money without making some meaningful donation to humankind.

To apply this to racism, we would need white business leaders to stand up in a big way against racism. I used to think this was the way to the promised land.

It’s not.

Powerful white men are not going to stand up against racism in meaningful ways for two reasons: (1) They are worried about how deep we must go to clean the wounds inflicted by racism and (2) They like power — letting others into the room (women, people of colour) would challenge that power because not everyone thinks like the white man — not everyone is kneeling at the alter of the white man’s ideology.

If my assertions are even somewhat true, it means we need to find a different way to combat racism.

We need to focus on beliefs, not symptoms or even systems as I have written about before. And as the authors of the study I mentioned assert — we need to show the white man that one of his primary beliefs — a belief even more ingrained than racsim — is in direct conflict with his racist beliefs.

The white man believes in capitalism.

It is his belief that his prowess in this field is the ultimate measure of success and an integral part of his identity.

What would happen if we built lots and lots of crazily successful ventures where the white male was a minority?

If we built thousands and thousands of hyper successful companies that were built without racism — he would have to reconcile his latent racism beliefs with his more powerful belief in money, capitalism.

Is this the entrenched belief we can use to create a real conversation about ending racism?

This isn’t any easier than the approach we have been taking to date— but, it has science on its side. And, I think we have enough people in power who would back enough of these ventures to make them a viable option for changing the belief system of the white man. With a changing demographic in the US of A and a focus on building ventures of all shapes and sizes — we could we have the makings of a significant cultural shift.

If we build it, will they come to their senses?