Degrees of disadvantage: Structural racism and the education-to-employment pipeline in UK higher education

Racial inequalities persist across UK higher education and graduate employment, yet these domains are often examined separately. This critical integrative review synthesises empirical, theoretical and policy literature published between 2016 and 2025 to examine how disadvantage is produced and reproduced across the education-to-employment pipeline. It integrates Critical Race Theory, intersectionality and Bourdieu’s theory of practice to analyse university experiences, capital accumulation and recognition, graduate recruitment, workplace inclusion and career progression. The review identifies interconnected inequalities in curricula, awarding outcomes, access to placements and professional networks, hiring, underemployment and progression. These processes vary through mutually constitutive relations of race, class, gender, religion and migration history and cannot be explained adequately through individualised accounts of aspiration, skills or employability. The article develops racialised capital conversion as an analytical mechanism for explaining why comparable qualifications, experiences, networks and dispositions receive unequal institutional recognition and labour-market returns. It also distinguishes employment entry from substantive workplace inclusion, showing how inequalities continue through restricted access to sponsorship, influential networks and leadership recognition. Sustained change requires coordinated accountability, redistribution of educational and employability-related capital, and reform across universities, employers and regulatory systems.