Structural Racism and Rigorous Models of Social Inequity

Structural racism refers to the public and private policies, institutional practices, norms, and cultural representations that inherently create unequal freedom, opportunity, value, resources, advantage, restrictions, constraints, or disadvantage for individuals and populations according to their race and ethnicity both across the life course and between generations. Developing a research agenda on structural racism includes consideration of the historical and contemporary policies and other structural factors that explicitly or implicitly affect the health and well-being of individuals, families, and communities, as well as strategies to measure those factors.


The Committee on Population of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine convened a 2-day public workshop on May 16-17, 2022, to identify and discuss the mechanisms through which structural racism operates, with a particular emphasis on health and well-being; to develop an agenda for future research and data collection on structural racism; and to strengthen the evidence base for policy making. Speaker presentations and workshop discussions provided insights into known sources of structural racism and rigorous models of health inequity, revealed novel sources and approaches informed by other disciplines and related fields, and highlighted key research and data priorities for future work on structural racism and health inequity.