International

Another flaming row over race

By Hasan Suroor

LONDON MAY 18. Barely a week after the Tory leadership sacked a party MP Ann Winterton from the shadow cabinet after she made an anti-Asian joke, it is under pressure to expel another activist for calling racism `natural', and denouncing multiculturalism as "wicked madness''.

Geoffrey Sampson has already been forced to step down as a Tory councillor in Sussex, but senior Labour figures including the Foreign Office Minister, Peter Hain, have called for his expulsion saying it is a test of the Tory leadership's avowed commitment to anti-racism. Professor Sampson's own colleagues at the University of Sussex have called for his resignation arguing that for a senior academic to hold such `racist' views was `untenable'.

The row erupted even as Ms. Winterton was reported to the police by a pressure group, Liberty and Law, accusing her of inciting "racist hooligans''. "Ms. Winterton's joke was not only offensive but bound to have been seen as threatening by people of Asian origin,'' Gerald Hartup, director of Liberty and Law, said. Police confirmed that the report had been passed on to the crime policy department. Ms. Winterton caught the headlines for cracking a joke in which an Englishman throws a Pakistani out of a train saying they came "ten a penny in Britain''.

The cause of the Tory Party's latest embarrassment is an article in which Prof. Sampson says that "there's nothing wrong with racism'' and claims that black people are "less bright'' than whites. The party quickly distanced itself from his remarks but the Labour and Liberal Democrats said that was not enough and he must be expelled if the Tory chief, Ian Duncan Smith, was serious about combating racism.

As an academic Professor Sampson is protected by the 1988 Education Act which permits freedom of speech but the University's students' union said his continuance was `detrimental' to the academic climate. It said black students could not be expected to have faith in a professor who regarded them as "genetically inferior''. Senior academics also expressed concern saying his "so-called research'' was based on "pseudo-psychology''. "I and many others think he should go, and we must have the strength to stand up to him,'' John Drury of the university's psychology department said.

Prof. Sampson however defended his remarks claiming they were an attempt to move forward debate on a difficult social issue. "Thinking and writing about such things and following inquiries even if they lead to unpopular conclusions is part of the task that society pays university staff for, and I am puzzled by the students' union suggestion that I ought to resign,'' he told The Times Higher Education Supplement.

The vice-chancellor, Alasdair Smith, said the university did not `condone' Prof. Sampson's views but the principle of academic freedom recognised an individual's right to hold personal views "however unpalatable''. But he warned these should not "impact on teaching or the treatment of staff or students''.

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