Black Lives Matter

Intellect stands solidly in support of Black Lives Matter at this time of injustice and protest in the United States, in the United Kingdom and around the globe. We stand resolute in the face of racism and we support people of colour against tyranny and systemic oppression in every form.

During this period of social unrest, we have taken time to reflect on our own systems and actions before making a public statement. Whilst Intellect operates a sound equal opportunities policy and we support global voices, including those of minorities and of the African diaspora, we realize there is much more we can do to take action against systemic racism. We have traditionally let our books and journals do the talking, but now is the time to be actively anti-racist.

Intellect is headquartered in Bristol, a city with a historical involvement in the transatlantic slave trade and its social and economic legacies. We acknowledge and celebrate the huge contributions made to this city by the people of the African diaspora and we must fight to help implement immediate change both in Bristol, in the United Kingdom and around the world.

Moving forward we will take action and institute changes across the company. Intellect will work closely with our community and especially those from Black backgrounds, to ensure we are adequately supporting our authors, editors and contributors. There is much to be done and this starts with communication and consultation. 

• We will actively seek ways to increase Black and marginalized voices through our publishing programmes. 
• We will improve access and we will celebrate and highlight the work of our Black community.
• Intellect will improve our recruitment practices in order to encourage people of colour to apply for job vacancies and join our internship programme. We are working with Creative Access to list our vacancies.
• We are sharing educational resources within our company and we plan to attend courses on issues such as unconscious bias. 
• We will encourage and assist our journal editors to recognize and remove bias from peer review and other publishing processes. 
• Intellect will support our partners in their efforts to stamp out all forms of racism and we will encourage new partnerships with organizations dedicated to this purpose.