Racism & Discrimination

But racism occurs every day in Australia and is endemic in our organisations, schools, media, governments, and communities.  The fact is that we are a racist country with a system of oppression and hierarchies between social groups based on perceived differences – place of origin, race, and cultural background, exacerbating societal inequalities structurally, institutionally, and interpersonally.

Despite the Racial Discrimination Act 1975 making it unlawful to treat someone unfairly because of their race, colour, descent, national or ethnic origin or immigrant status, racism in Australia is, according to our Race Discrimination Commissioner, ‘entrenched in the systems, structures, and institutions of Australia since colonisation. It is pervasive and causes real harm to people every single day. It leads to worse health outcomes, poorer educational outcomes, over representation in the justice system, negative representation in the media, and consistent roadblocks in employment’.

Racism is more than just prejudice between people or groups of people. Racism occurs when prejudice is accompanied by the power to harm, oppress or discriminate, either by individuals, organisations or systems. Racism can take many forms, including systemic racism, institutional racism, societal racism and individual/interpersonal racism. Racism can be conscious or unconscious, active or passive, obvious or subtle.

Even though mistreatment and discrimination are commonly experienced by people from African and Asian backgrounds with nearly half made to feel different or as if they did not belong in the last 12 month, the Australian-born population are at least as likely as overseas-born Australians to recognise racism as a problem. In 2025, nearly seven in ten Australian-born adults believe that racism is a fairly or very big problem in Australia, a similar proportion to those born in Asia or Africa. 

It's often said, especially by our politicians, that Australia is a world-leading multicultural country. Since the arrival of the first Europeans, the country has accepted in an estimated ten million migrants, including nearly a million refugees and others in humanitarian need.

Despite the longstanding racism and discrimination, and perhaps because most of us, or our family, are migrants to this country, with a majority of us born overseas or having at least one parent born overseas, we continue to view multiculturalism and diversity as good for Australia.  Today, two-thirds of Australians agree that accepting immigrants from many different countries makes Australia stronger, while more than four in five agree that multiculturalism has been good for Australia, that immigrants are generally good for Australia’s economy, and that immigrants improve Australian society by bringing new ideas and cultures.  However, the explosion of migrant arrivals post-COVID to record 737,000 migrant arrivals in 2023-23, up 73 per cent from the year before, has resurfaced the issue of immigration, with the influx being blamed for exacerbating cost-of-living pressures, the housing crisis, overstretched health services, and congested cities. 

With the number of temporary migrants in the country at any one time at a record nearly 2.5 million, over half of Australians now believe that the number of immigrants accepted into Australia at present’ is ‘too high’ (as opposed to ‘too low’ or ‘about right’), a rate that has doubled in the last three years.

Among those who think immigration is too high, nearly six in ten think the economy or housing shortages and affordability is the most important problem facing Australia in 2025. This is corroborated by a 2024 survey of 2,000 voting-age Australians which found that nearly two-third of Australians either agree or strongly agree that ‘the current rate of immigration is making housing less affordable’.  

The fact is that it doesn’t. Modelling by Monash University and RMIT found that the cost of housing grew by 1.1 per cent more to in each year between 2006 and 2016 than would have happened if there was no migration.  This is only a small fraction of the 6 per cent annual house price growth that occurred over that period.  Since the 2023 peak, net migration has fallen sharply to 2009 levels and is expected to fall further, but this is unlikely to stop the right wing’s political playbook stance over demonising migrants and against a ‘Big Australia’.

Blaming migrants is not new. But, as Australia’s race discrimination commissioner, Giridharan Sivaraman, notes, ‘taking the easy but misleading route of blaming migrants for economic insecurity only serves to stoke the already smouldering fires of racism’.

Despite studies consistently finding that ethnic diversity improves business performance, with diverse and inclusive workplaces being more profitable, innovative, creative, and engaging, a 2023 study showed that discrimination is widespread in the Australian job market.  A team of experts designed more than 12,000 identical resumes for more than 4,000 job applications, altering the applicant’s name to represent different ethnicities. The applications were made across 12 different occupations, ranging from high-skilled jobs needing a university degree, medium-skilled jobs where a qualification was required, and low-skilled jobs where only previous experience was desirable.

Despite their resumes being almost identical, with the same level of experience and qualifications, applicants with non-English names were 57 per cent less likely to receive a positive response for a leadership role and 45 per cent less likely to be considered for a non-leadership role.

Our workplaces are also racist. In its 2023 survey of over 1,500 workers from various sectors and organisations across Australia, the Diversity Council of Australia found that 93 per cent felt that Australian organisations needed to take action to address racism whilst only 27 per cent reported that their organisations had been proactive in preventing workplace racism.

Furthermore, the latest Inclusion@Work Index reports that under half of workers felt their teams are inclusive and just three in ten reported their manager is inclusive, representing a steady decline since 2019.  

Based on a succession of research reports, racism is also widespread in Australia’s educational settings and racism within Australian schools remains a significant barrier to accessing, engaging and succeeding in education.

The seminal 2017 Speak Out Against Racism study found that 43 per cent of students saw incidents of racial discrimination directed towards other students by teachers, and over 40 per cent of Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander students or students from culturally and linguistically diverse communities experienced racial discrimination from their peers.  Many teachers reported feeling underprepared to respond to racism in the classroom.

A 2019 research report found that 40 percent of non-white Australian students are victims of racial discrimination at school and that many of these students are left feeling as if racism has become a part of their everyday life. Furthermore, a 2020 study reiterated that it is common for non-white Australian students to experience racism through micro-aggressions from teachers and peers, as well as systemic exclusions based on Eurocentric curricula that exclude non-white students’ experiences and preferences.

As the great unifier in Australian culture, it would seem that ‘sport provides a unified sense of community with Aussies cheering on our cross-cultural representation, where respect and teamwork create an inclusive environment of camaraderie that rises above intolerance and exclusion’.  However, according to Sport Integrity Australia, racism exists in all levels of Australian sport − from juniors through to elite − from participants through to match officials, volunteers, fans, coaches and beyond.   Racism starts early. A 2019 study found that ‘racial vilification was a common occurrence among players in junior sports, as well as with spectators…with non-white children being the targets of most abuse’.

Even our governments have been found to be racist. A 2024 report by the Australian Human Rights Commission found governments and their departments at all levels across the country are failing to adequately identify and address racism – even avoiding the term ‘racism’ – and that approaches across the board are ad-hoc, disjointed, reactive, and lacking coordination between governments, agencies and sectors.

Racist reporting is rife in the Australian media. Over three-quarters of television news and current affairs presenters, commentators and reporters have an Anglo-Celtic background. Just 6 per cent were from an Indigenous or non-European background. Nearly eight in ten journalists with diverse backgrounds believe having a diverse cultural background is a barrier to career progression. While the ABC and SBS charters require them to measure and report on cultural diversity, commercial networks do not. A 2021 media snapshot by charity All Together Now found that 89 per cent of the negatively racialised opinion pieces were authored by people of Anglo-Celtic and/or European backgrounds, while most of the opinion pieces authored by Aboriginal, Torres Strait Islander and people of colour were inclusive. In an independent review in October 2024, found that ABC staff reported being subjected to racial slurs, exclusion due to their cultural background, and being mistaken for a more junior person based on their racial appearance.

In the meantime, the growth in, and anonymity of, social media has resulted in an explosion of racism online. Australia’s e-Safety Commissioner reported in 2025 that adults who identify as sexually diverse, Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander, with disability, and/or as linguistically diverse are more likely both to see (41 per cent) and to personally experience (24 per cent) online hate.  A minority of targeted adults surveyed who had encountered online hate said they took action after seeing it (28–32 per cent) or personally experiencing it (38–44 per cent).