United States: The Government of the United States has taken modernized its criteria for categorizing individuals by race and ethnicity after a hiatus spanning more than twenty-five years, with the aim of more accurately reflecting an increasingly varied populace and providing policymakers with a more comprehensive understanding of the Americans affected by their endeavours.
The US Office of Management and Budget made public its decision on Thursday to consolidate inquiries regarding race and ethnicity on federal documents while encouraging individuals to indicate multiple options where applicable. Additionally, the government will introduce “Middle Eastern or North African” (MENA) as a novel category within the amalgamated question, encompassing a total of seven choices, according to The Washington Post.
These alterations signify the first adjustment to the OMB’s policy on federal data collection since 1997.
Meeta Anand, senior director for census and data equity at the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, a coalition comprising over 200 civil rights organizations, hailed the combined question as “one of the most substantial changes we’ve ever witnessed.”
In a blog post on the White House website, Karin Orvis, the United States’ principal statistician, expressed that the revision will “augment our capacity to compare information and data across federal agencies, as well as comprehend how federal initiatives serve a diverse America.”
The revisions are anticipated to manifest across various federal data-gathering forms, including the decennial census surveys and the more frequently conducted American Community Survey, which encompasses a broader array of inquiries.
This data is pivotal in informing federal evaluations spanning from healthcare outcomes to the delineation of congressional districts, as per Washington Post.
The updated standards are effective immediately, although agencies are afforded 18 months to formulate compliance strategies and five years for full implementation.
The Census Bureau lauded the scientific integrity and collaborative effort underpinning the new standards.
The process leading to these modifications commenced in June 2022, when Orvis convened a working group comprising career personnel from 35 federal agencies. The group solicited over 20,000 public comments and conducted 94 listening sessions.
An Egyptian American attorney endorsing the new MENA category remarked, “As a society, we cannot ensure equitable rights and protections for all unless we can accurately identify those impacted by explicit and implicit discrimination resulting from systemic biases.”
Progress towards these changes has been ongoing, albeit impeded during Donald Trump’s presidency, who sought to incorporate a citizenship query in the 2020 Census, an endeavor thwarted by the Supreme Court, The Washington Post noted.
Advocates have long advocated for a unified inquiry into race and ethnicity, citing research indicating that separate inquiries impede data collection among Latino respondents.
The 2020 Census marked the first instance where “Some Other Race” emerged as the second-largest racial group in the United States.
The Arab American Institute, a non-profit based in Washington, lauded the revised standards as a significant achievement, anticipating an end to the erasure of Arab Americans in federal data collection.
Simultaneously, the institute expressed reservations that Arab Americans may continue to be undercounted as the new MENA category fails to fully encapsulate the diversity within these communities.
Among those advocating for a MENA category was Senator Gary Peters, a Democrat representing Michigan, home to a substantial Arab American populace. Peters asserted that the changes “will finally enable the enumeration of Arab Americans as a distinct community, facilitating governmental provision of resources and support tailored to their needs.”