Equality Law: A Structural Turn

Abstract Equality law has developed into a mature and sophisticated field of law across jurisdictions. At the same time, inequality too has bourgeoned. This Article explores this paradox. It argues that the widening gulf between equality law and persisting inequalities can be addressed through a ‘structural turn’ in equality law. The structural turn is imagined in contrast with the liberal view which sees the harm of inequality/discrimination as something inflicted by and against individuals or collectivities through specific acts or omissions. The structural view places individual victims and perpetrators within the broader dimensions of the social, economic, legal, political, psychic and cultural contexts in which they exist and the power relations within them. The way these dimensions interact with each other and against the relationships of power within them, reveals how structural harm is occasioned. This Article argues that structural harm need not only be treated as a product of structures, including a structure such as equality law, but as the target of equality law which is open to not only enacting structural harm but also structural change.