In the Blood: The Consequences of Naturalising Microsegregation in Workplace Social Networks
研究后种族隔离南非一家银行总部的职场社交网络，发现空间使用延续了殖民和种族隔离时期的微观隔离模式，黑人银行家通过语言和文化差异话语合理化隔离，同时通过社交网络展现能动性，但代表权不足以确保包容。
This study explored workplace social networks in order to understand practices of inclusion and exclusion in the context of an increasingly diverse workplace in post-apartheid South Africa. We found that the ways in which space is occupied shows marked continuities with the era of formalised segregation during the preceding periods of colonialism and apartheid. We contend that intergroup relations theory and homophily assist in providing a partial understanding of the pervasive microsegregation observed within a South African organisation. We offer that a historied account of the continuing race-based accounts of microsegregation is more productive for understanding this phenomenon in a country with a past that formalised segregation across all areas of social life. We explore the meanings that people assign to segregation patterns within the workplace based on data emerging out of 54 interviews, nine naturalistic observations and a group discussion conducted within the headquarters of a major bank in Johannesburg. Discourses of linguistic and cultural differences were used to rationalise segregation and naturalise racialised differences. The material effects of segregation were noted to be particularly onerous for Black bankers. As a capitalist class, we however found that Black bankers resist, adapt, subvert and reinscribe power relations in ways that simultaneously serve their interests while also potentially limiting their opportunities. We point to the agentic aspects of social networks for marginalised groups and contend that representation is not sufficient to ensure inclusion.