The Foreign Office Advertised Jobs In Africa As "An Adventure" - 0 views
www.buzzfeed.com/...fco-african-adventure
diplomacy UK FCO Britain inclusion diversity Africa colonialism
shared by Ed Webb on 07 Mar 19
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The UK Foreign Office has taken down an internal job advert after coming under fire from its own staff for using "colonial era" language to advertise postings based in African countries.
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The advert covered a number of available jobs, spanning a range of areas at various grades, which were grouped together under the tagline "Fancy an African Adventure?"It had been posted on internal civil service networks, and prompted criticism from FCO staff, who said the tone was more suited to an advert for a gap year holiday.
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"Civil servants should not be going to 'Africa' for an 'Adventure' - overseas roles are not there for escaping from boredom at home, and framing them in this way harks back to colonial-era fantasies of a temporary tropical getaway as a character-building career boost."
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it does not encourage forward-thinking, diverse and inclusive applicants, but those rooted in colonial era notions of overseas postings
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In a booklet published last year, Black Skin, Whitehall, FCO historian James Southern identified a lack of diversity within the FCO and the resulting issues that this raised.
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"Clearly, there are aspects of the problem of racism in recruitment that are buried too deeply for surface-level enthusiasm for ‘equal opportunities’ or ‘meritocracy’ to penetrate – admirable though such enthusiasm might be."In order fully to understand the FCO’s relationship with race, we must excavate and investigate the often subconscious forms of racism that affect the experiences of non-white diplomats."