Anti-Racism as Praxis – A Conversation with Tendayi Achiume

E. Tendayi Achiume — UN Special Rapporteur on Contemporary Forms of Racism from 2017 to 2022 — is one of the preeminent legal minds working on the relationship between race, colonialism, and international law. My co-editor Claire Smith and I were honoured to count her as a contributor to Emancipating International Law — alongside her co-authors Asli Bâli and Priya Morley — not only because of the intrinsic value of the intervention, but because Tendayi’s scholarship pervades the collection as a whole.

Her work on racial borders influenced chapters by Nciko wa Nciko and Jinan Bastaki; her reflections on racial aphasia and the epistemology of racism shaped my own text and thinking, as well as the epilogue by Christopher Gevers and chapters by Jason Haynes and Shahab Saqib; and her insights on the institutional politics of racial justice within the UN system serve as a constant interlocutor for Yang Han and several contributors. A quick search of the text generates countless references to her scholarship and to her personally.

This episode of Fresh Squeezed! was recorded some months ago and features a conversation between Tendayi, Claire, and myself. Three exchanges stood out most of all.

Tendayi’s account of 2020 comes first. In contrast to certain other interlocutors, she did not see that moment as either spontaneous or as an awakening. Rather, she situated the demand for racial justice alongside demands for decolonisation and reparations; the legacies of colonialism continue to saturate international law, making that eruption not only predictable but inevitable.

Her thoughts on methodological whiteness follow — a concept I am still grappling with, and tried to tease out in the introduction to the symposium. She referenced the Southern African Development Community (SADC) Tribunal, which operated with a colourblind methodology applied, ironically, by non-white judges who acted to entrench the very racial hierarchy they purported to adjudicate neutrally.

The third is a metaphor she offers near the end of the conversation, one that has stayed with me and altered my perspective on our discipline. She describes international law as a cemetery — a place where “power keeps the bodies buried”. Anti-racist practice, she contends, demands that we excavate the graveyard, a little like what was done with Patrice Lumumba, whose remains were finally returned to his family in 2022, sixty years after his assassination — honouring our ancestors, and ourselves, and countering the white ignorance that continues to batter the field. There is nothing despairing in her metaphor; it is a methodological awareness that each contributor, in their own way, sought to follow.

I close with a word of explanation. This conversation was recorded some months ago, and we are only releasing it now. The delay was deliberate: we wanted Tendayi’s podcast to accompany the formal launch of Emancipating International Law, as well as the ancillary events including last week’s symposium and the panel at IGLP. The podcast remains as incisive today as it was when first recorded and functions as a companion to the ongoing struggle rather than a standalone event, highlighting the persistent need for anti-racist work and the importance of drawing connections across space and time.

Tendayi has been patient and we are grateful for her understanding. We hope you agree the wait was worth it, and that her insights support you in your anti-racist praxis.

Many thanks to (Dr) Claire Smith; the interview would have been far different were it not for her questions and follow-ups. And my gratitude to Dr Omar Kamel for his assistance with the production of this podcast.