Ségolène Pruvot, September 2021
(note: many of the hyperlinks lead to pages in French)
In March 2021, in France, one of the few visible black politicians, Audrey Pulvar, ex-journalist, Deputy Mayor of Paris and candidate to the presidency of the Ile de France (Paris) region, got vehemently attacked for her defence of the practice of non-mix working groups of people victims of race-based discrimination within the student organisation UNEF, putting the question of non-mixity of working groups to the forefront of the public debate for a couple of weeks.
The – short – version of the episode is the following: The student’s union UNEF publicly admitted that some speech-groups they organise within their movement were non-mix, i.e. open only to racialized people and people identifying themselves as victims of discriminations. This in itself started a public outcry and violent reactions towards the UNEF President Melanie Luce (see Mediapart video for more details).
Audrey Pulvar – one of the visible and quite famous racialized public figures and politicians in France – attempted – admittedly clumsily - to defend this practice and said that white people could attend those groups but could be asked ‘not to speak’. The way she phrased it did stir a public outcry in a country in which the lure of universalism is public religion.
The main issue, notably for those representing the French State like the Ministers who reacted to the events, was that these groups were ‘not open to white people’, thereby enforcing a racialized separation between people, and excluding some groups on the basis of race. The Minister of Education, Jean-Michel Blanquer, even pointed out these practices as ‘potentially leading to fascism’.
There would be much debate about this ‘story’, notably on the issue of institutional racism in France (a taboo expression in France), but here it is used to highlight how complex the issue of non-mixity can become.
For activists the question shall be: Is the use of non mixity justified and useful? If yes, in which context? What cause does it serve or deserve? Is it efficient? When to use it and when not?
Non-mix working groups: a recognized practice in the feminist movement
In her defence of non-mix groups, Melanie Luce kept on referring to the feminist movement. Indeed, in the feminist movements, non-mix speech groups have for long been well known and practiced instruments for forming the consciousness of oppression and elaborating common lines of action of activist struggles.
For the feminists of the 70’s, in order to create safe spaces, they had to be non-mix and one easily understood. Of course, this was not accepted smoothly at the time, neither within, nor outside of the movement. ‘Safe space’ refers to both the ‘safe’ conditions to be provided for marginalised and vulnerable people to express themselves and to the protection of the physical safety of individuals within a set space. In today’s words, one could say that a ‘safe space’ is non-discriminatory, secure, empowering.
An example of organisation of such a small group, that is a safe space is provided by Pamela Allen in her text ‘Free Space’ (1970). The group she participated in and she refers to in the text, is one composed of women in San Francisco in 1968, who worked together durably in order to create the conditions to remedy forms of oppressions. Pamela Allen’s text clearly expresses what non-mix settings bring to those who have not had the possibility to express themselves in environments perceived as safe and empowering before. The small group is, according to her “especially suited to freeing women to affirm their own view of reality and to think independently of men's supremacist values. It is a space where women can come to understand not only the ways this society works to keep women oppressed but ways to overcome that oppression psychologically and socially. It is Free Space”. Beyond exchanges and consciousness raising, such a space provides ground for the formation of political consciousness and political action. ‘We have defined our group as a place in which to think: to think about our lives, our society, and our potential for being creative and for building a women’s movement.’
In this case, the small group is extremely useful to those women who joined it, but it is not an end in itself, and is not the unit that can by itself create and promote change: “specifically we have begun to have a clear understanding of what role the small group can and cannot play in this social revolution. It is clear to us that the small group is neither an action oriented political group in and of itself.” The non-mix group was there the right setting for women, who would not otherwise have had such a possibility within the family unit of the mainstream (dominated by men) political movement, to develop the ideology and the thoughts that create the backbone for action in defence of their own interests.
The non mix-group does become an instrument for organising the defence of rights attached to the specific situation of a group within the social structures, but it does not necessarily end in a blunt confrontation with and exclusion of other groups, such as the experience of the Combahee River Collective Statement (1977) issued by the eponym Lesbian Black Feminist group teaches us.
On non-mix groups and alliances for political outcomes: lessons from the American Black Feminist movement
In the 70’s the White Feminists were denounced by Black Feminists for failing to be sensitive to the issue of race. By being focussed on patriarchalism, those groups, according to the Combahee River Collective, failed at understanding specific issues linked to what we now call intersectionality and failed at becoming non-racists groups, truly open to others.
“Black, other Third World, and working women have been involved in the feminist movement from its start, but both outside reactionary forces and racism and elitism within the movement itself have served to obscure our participation. In 1973, Black feminists, primarily located in New York, felt the necessity of forming a separate Black feminist group. This became the National Black Feminist Organization (NBFO)."
The fact that American Black Feminists had to develop an alternative movement to the white feminists shows at the same time the limitations and the power of non-mix groups. Like Pamela Allen’s group, the Combahee River Collective realises that the small group is the right place to develop “identity politics” but not necessarily the right unit to realise social progress, which cannot be obtained without a dutiful alliance, in their case, with the Black Liberation Movement.
The Combahee River Collective, by meeting in a small group non-mix setting did create the space for thinking, conceiving, understanding politics that were « the need to develop a politics that was anti-racist, unlike those of white women, and anti-sexist, unlike those of Black and white men. ». It is in this setting in particular that the members of the collective became able to develop an « integrated analysis and practice based upon the fact that the major systems of oppression are interlocking. »
However, its members do not conceive action possible outside of alliances with others that share the same objectives and ideals:
« We reject the stance of Lesbian separatism because it is not a viable political analysis or strategy for us. It leaves out far too much and far too many people, particularly Black men, women, and children. We have a great deal of criticism and loathing for what men have been socialized to be in this society: what they support, how they act, and how they oppress. But we do not have the misguided notion that it is their maleness, per se—i.e., their biological maleness— that makes them what they are. As BIack women we find any type of biological determinism a particularly dangerous and reactionary basis upon which to build a politic. »
That is why their statement insist on the fact that:
“We have been involved in the process of defining and clarifying our politics, while at the same time doing political work within our own group and in coalition with other progressive organizations and movements. »
Here non-mix groups appear as one of the elements of a liberation movement, but not as an effective social movement in itself. There is a lot more to learn from the Combahee River Collective Statement, but that’s already a key point, which can help within activism today.
It is unsurprising that one of today’s most visible, strong and transnational social movement #BlackLivesMatters appears to be a follower of the Black Feminist Movement. Indeed, #BlackLivesMatter hashtag has been initiated by Queer Black Women. The movement has been working in a non exclusionary way, leaving space for all people who wished to, to join and express their outcry in the face of the continuing forms of police and state violence against racialized people. In the same way, the need for separatism that has existed in the 70’s ‘White’ feminist movements in many parts of Europe has fainted, for a form of feminism that usually accepts men, LGBTQI+ and other vulnerable people, as allies in the search for fighting and denouncing oppressive structures and proposing alternative forms of social organisations.
Grains of change rather than separatism
Drawing the conclusion that non-mix groups gathering leads to separatism and exclusion sounds all the more hasty. At the light of these examples, and while being cautious to the objectives and forms of organisations of non-mix groups, without being angelic, one can serenely advance that such groups can be useful for activism today. They may help develop a fine understanding of situations, an understanding that would be impossible to develop in other settings. The understanding of issues of intersectionality for instance has been extremely connected with the Lesbian Black Feminist Movement, as we saw.
If non-mix groups may become a threat to the established system, it is not necessarily because of the risk of ‘separatism’ that they would entail, but because they may in fact provide the right grounds to understand how oppression and discrimination functions, and because they may provide the right space for empowerment and for the development of alternative ideologies.
Such gatherings may contain the grains of revolution and change that would unsettle outdated structures and social organisations known for being unable to prevent racism and oppression, but they may only do so if strong and wide alliances with others are formed and others are included rather than excluded.
Ségolène Pruvot is a Cultural Director of European Alternatives. Ségolène has developed extensive experience in designing and implementing transnational participative cultural programmes. She curated, managed and coordinated artistic projects in several European countries, including Transeuropa Festival. Ségolène is a Doctor in Urban Sociology. In the course of her academic career and professional life, she specialised in the exploration of the intersection between arts, the city and social change. Her PhD Thesis, realised at the University of Milano Bicocca, is entitled Can Participatory Arts Help Deliver (more) Socially Just Creative Cities? There she explored how the theoretical input of contemporary art theory can help better understand the role of arts in the city. She trained as a political scientist and urban planner in France, the UK, and Germany. Ségolène is passionate about the city, equality, feminism, migrant and minority rights.