Grumbles from the Pulpit: The Census

The Census - Poor Questions Part 1: Cultural or Ethnic Background

Some of the census questions seem to be poorly written. For instance, under cultural or ethnic background, we have "Asian, Asian British or Asian Jersey", but the options below don't include those and you have to answer in the text box. And then there's "Mixed" which includes "Other mixed background, write in...".

Last time I wasn't sure that cultural or ethnic background was a really solid scientific category, and this time I'm just as convinced. I know we hear in the USA, for example, of African-American as a category, but I don't think that makes a huge amount of sense in Jersey. And what precisely is "White" anyway? Do Italians or Greeks or Turks count as "White"? Do Arabs, and if not why might Israelis?

And is race actually lurking as a hidden category behind some of these supposed categories.

Kid's in the House has a clear definition of differences, and while I might not wholly agree with it, at least it provides some solid definitions:

"Culture, ethnicity and race are terms that we often confuse and think mean the same thing, but they are actually different. Culture is something we're taught by other human beings. That's how we learn culture, and generally speaking by elders. People who are older than us, that are passing something down, generation to generation. Ethnicity has to do with nationality. Where we come from, so I might be .. someone is Asian, but their different ethnicities would be a Korean person, a Chinese person, a Filipino person. All Asian, but different ethnicities. Race is the most loaded term of all. And that's because race is actually not something that's genetic, although we like to think that it is. It's something that has to do with power hierarchies. We've used race in this country to make one set of people have more privilege and power than another. And that's kind of an ugly little truth that we don't like to talk about. But the reality is race matters, and in families where we are more than one race, or raising people of color who've been in targeted groups, we have to learn to talk about this. Or we are not going to be able to learn and help children learn how to feel good about who they are, and understand that they don't have to be victims to racism."

What we have in the census is pure muddle - conflating culture and ethnicity, and I suspect also including race. Why else is "White", which is nether cultural nor ethnic background, heading one segment? I'd like to see the hard science behind creating these categories which seem very fuzzy to me. Why is Jersey only listed under White? How is Asian Jersey (of maybe several generations) different from White Jersey? What is this information going to be used for? It seems to me more a legacy of an imperial past than of current importance.

Where were you born, on the other hand, is a far more solid question. You can only be born in one place - even if born on board a ship or plane, it is one location.

The Census - Poor Questions Part 2: Legal Marital Status

This question is so limited. It ignores the number of cohabiting couples who live in Jersey. Is there a question relating to that? No. And so while useful perhaps for assessing pensions, tax provisions, etc etc, in terms of building up a picture of how many couples there are cohabiting, some of whom may even have children, there is a black hole. We don't know and won't know the size of that hole, because
no questions address it. Why is it important? The USA report on their census explains why:

"As cohabition has become increasingly common and accepted in the United States, statistical agencies face an increased need to gather data on cohabition as well as marital status in order to get a more complete picture of family structure. Statistics on unwed births often include cases where biological parents are unmarried, but cohabiting and planning to raise the child together. Cohabiting couples with children often function much like families that have married parents, but are often categorized as single parents in statistical analyses. Additionally, gay and lesbian couples with children also often fuction as family units, without being married. These households may look like single parent families, with no indication that the child has two parents in the household. Many researchers are interested in the impact of cohabitation on children's well-being. In order to study this, we must be able to identify cohabiting couples with children."

The Census - Poor Questions Part 3: Transport

The transport question doesn't ask if alternative forms of transport are available from the person's location. Clearly, someone who is elderly and/or infirm can hardly be expected to use public transport in remote locations, some distance from the nearest bus stop, and it doesn't even include mobility scooters either.

There are a number of reasons why people use different modes of transport to get to work including the availability of affordable and effective public transport options, the number of motor vehicles available within a household, and the distance travelled to work. The census is a very blunt instrument on this question.

The Census - Missing Questions Part 4: Disability

There is nothing on disability, which would really be more useful than ethnic or cultural background in assessing needs of islanders. For example, there's nothing on the deaf community, some of whom communicate only in British Sign Language, or whom it is the first language. For that matter, there's nothing on first language or whether people can speak English well.

The HOH (Hard of Hearing) population in jersey is potentially 1 in 6. that’s a lot of people becoming deaf and needing support, and the statistics are sometimes missing. If an individual uses the hearing resource centre, it may be picked up, but not otherwise, either because they can't use a hearing aid anyway, or have obtained one privately.

Resourcing disability is I think more important that knowing if someone is white.