What is equity?

The following text is adapted slightly; Kristine Miller wrote about the need for equity to be considered in public and environmental design, but what she's describing is true for educational design, as well. While she's considering transit and green space, we're considering a classroom space, albeit virtual.

In the past few years, unfortunately, the term equity has become ubiquitous and its definition murky. It seems like every government report or new foundation initiative has incorporated the word into its title. In “Is Equity the New Coconut Water?,” Vu Le comments on the term’s overuse in Seattle: You can’t walk down the street without hearing someone saying something like, “Equity. Equity, equity, equity. Blah blah community engagement Seahawks equity” (Vu, 2014).

If the term has lost its intended meaning, should we, as Vu Le asks, put it back on the grocery store shelf next to the kombucha? Does it still have value to designers working for social justice? I think we need to keep it (or take it back, depending on your view). Its prevalence presents ample opportunities to spark conversations about its real meaning. Each time the word is spoken—in a public meeting or behind closed doors, in a foundation report or a design proposal—there is an opening, a moment when an important and difficult conversation about systemic racial disparities could occur.

But equity does not mean equal because the playing field is not level. We don’t start from a point of equality. There is value in the specific and surprising turn of phrase required in defining equity. We see the word equity and think equal—everyone receiving the same amount of benefits or suffering the same risks related to any new policy or project. That seems fair. But equity does not mean equal, because the playing field is not level. We don’t start from a point of equality. Throughout our history and up to today, unfair policies have privileged certain groups of people over others. Privilege exists when one group has something of value that others do not because of the groups they belong to, not because of what they have done or failed to do.

This disjuncture between equity as equal and equity as fair can fuel the conversations needed to make San Francisco, Portland, Austin, Madison, and Minneapolis/St. Paul into places where everyone has the chance to flourish—conversations that acknowledge and examine the history of this privilege and its specific impact on people in each city.

Equity is an ethical principle, a position on what is good and right. It refers to the fair distribution of impacts—both benefits and costs. To quote Braveman and Gruskin, two health equity researchers:

…equity…is the absence of systematic disparities…between groups with different levels of underlying social advantage/disadvantage—that is, wealth, power, or prestige. Inequities…put groups of people who are already socially disadvantaged (for example, by virtue of being poor, female, and/or members of a disenfranchised racial, ethnic, or religious group) at further disadvantage…. (Braveman & Gruskin, 2003, p. 254)

Equity does not mean numerically equal. It does not mean, for example, that the same amount of transit should be available to all people. Why? For low income families, who spend 45% of their income on transportation, a change in routes or schedules can mean less time at home, and missing the bus because of inconsistent scheduling can mean losing a job. For these families, the costs and risks are higher than they are for me. I have direct access to two cars, know lots of people with access to cars who could help in a pinch, and won’t get fired if I’m late for work.

Another reason to take hold of the word equity is that if we don’t clearly define and deploy the word, it will be usurped by those with the most power—usually those with the least interest in making better outcomes for people who historically and presently have the most at stake. It’s not just professionals or government officials who say “equity” but mean equal; it’s also community members involved in public participation processes. Depending on your implicit definition of equity, you are going to argue for very different design and planning approaches [2] --  ones that either benefit everyone or benefit a few.

This text is from Chapter 1 of Design Equity by Kristine Miller (licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License).