They came by the dozens, the daily June promises from fashion brands to improve diversity; the black social media squares situated above pledges to listen, learn, change; the dedications to making a difference on inclusion despite little prior interest in it.
“I’m not going to say that the efforts that I’ve seen by companies are not of value, I just don’t know if that value has permanence without a more thoughtful policy implementation,” said Kibwe Chase-Marshall, cofounder of The Kelly Initiative, an effort rolled out over the summer dedicated to creating equitable inroads for Black fashion professionals via a four-point plan to increase industry transparency.
For those brands that have made the attempt to process it and take action, many are approaching diversity as an easy fix, using chief diversity officers, diversity councils and $100 million funds for racial equity as Band-Aids. “Those instances of optics,” he said, “just shore up that things will remain the way they are and that people that have solidified those systems of inequity won’t be taken to task because they can trot out this ad campaign or this one collab.”“A lot of [brands] are scrambling, especially before Black History Month because they know that the conversation is going to turn back into [diversity] so all of them are trying to sign deals with people.
“The CFDA has never thoughtfully addressed why it has not moved to implement that type of census,” Chase-Marshall said, noting two years’ worth of attempts to engage the organization. “They have brushed aside conversations by saying they don’t have the authority to force anyone to reveal that data, and that’s common knowledge, but they do have the influence to encourage brands and organizations to do so.
“Diversity is the new challenge of the future, of the next five years,” Chuter said. “Over the last 10 years it was things like sustainability, which is still a challenge, but companies had to start focusing on that [and things like the] animal rights issue. But isn’t it interesting that animal rights issues got tackled before [diversity]?”