by Dr. Jenna Butler

I wish to open this piece by acknowledging two foundational things: first, that the work of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) is always done within an existing colonial framework, and that although important and necessary changes may absolutely be done through such work, the framework itself is problematic. DEI is the process of restructuring to include communities that have been historically excluded; it is not the work of building, from the ground up, with these communities.

Second, I wish to acknowledge that a calling to account is not necessarily an indictment of the work being done, but in cases like that of the Diversity Baseline Survey, it is an indictment of the work that is not being followed through. It takes time to enact meaningful, inclusive change, this is true. For the purpose of this article, though, what I believe needs parsing is the difference between change for the sake of appearance versus change for the sake of right action.

On February 23, the Association of Canadian Publishers, in partnership with the Canadian Publishers’ Council, released the results of the 2022 Canadian Book Publishing Industry Diversity Baseline Survey. For those writing and publishing from diverse communities in Canada, specifically those identifying as BIPOC, 2SLGBTQ+, or disabled, the results were unsurprising.

For the past five years, the Association of Canadian Publishers (ACP) has recognized the critical underrepresentation of BIPOC, 2SLGBTQ+, and disabled members in the publishing industry in this country, and in 2017, it established a working group (now a standing committee) to look into possible solutions for this lack of fair representation. At the time of the working group’s first report, released in 2018, the publishing industry showed a marked imbalance:

82% of respondents identified as white; 72% were straight; 74% were women; 80% were non-disabled. When heads of firms were asked if they had plans for any new initiatives to support diversity, equity, and inclusion, close to half answered no—and many shared that although they already had DEI policies in place, it was still challenging to move the dial in practice. (2022 Diversity Baseline Survey, pg. 4)

Flash forward to the new report, a scant five years later, and aside from some small shifts, the survey results look discomfortingly similar:

• The industry as a whole has stayed majority white, though with a drop from 82% to 75%. The claim that this is a “statistically significant shift” rings hollow, given the makeup of a country as diverse as this, and taking particular account of the demographics of the urban centres in which nearly all publishers are located (this is, at least, a point noted in the report).
• Whereas 7–20% more respondents identified as BIPOC across the various departments surveyed, the number of BIPOC executives and interns fell by 2% and 5%, respectively. (Let me note at this juncture, employing the same language used above in regard to the white industry majority, that this is a statistically significant shift, particularly given how few BIPOC community members work in publishing at the executive level. However, it is not recognized as such in the DBS report. Let me also note that internship positions tend, by far, to be the lowest paid, least term-certain, and most exploited positions in the publishing industry. Given this context, that statistically significant drop in the number of BIPOC interns over the past year might just speak for itself.) In an ideal world, this drop in numbers would represent BIPOC interns moving up the ladder within respective companies and out of internship positions; however, even if that eventually proved true, the statistics about the heads of companies indicate that the BIPOC ladder, overwhelmingly, does not extend that far.
• Publicity is the least diverse department in Canadian publishing at 79% white-identifying. Though this was formerly a dubious honour accorded to sales, it still begs the question: How is fair representation in publishing attainable when publicity—designed to inform the reading public of new and upcoming titles from all authors, including those of diverse backgrounds—is still so skewed?

Some positive gains have indeed been made in 2SLGBTQ+ presences in multiple departments across publishing firms that had, five years ago, identified almost entirely as cisgender and heterosexual, and respondents who self-identified as having a disability rose 9% from 17% in 2018 to 26% in this year’s report. I do not, by any means, desire to downplay the importance of these vital gains, as well as the knock-on effect from the pandemic of online work from home that continues to prove a crucial benefit to many people with disabilities. It is instructive to read the potential justification behind this increase in self-reporting, however: perhaps a lessening of the stigma attached to less “visible” disabilities such as chronic illness, neurodiversities, etc., and the potential fallout from respondents whose health care lapsed during the height of the pandemic may be contributing factors. I am left wondering whether another potential reason for the higher incidences of self-identification has been glossed over or left out: with the increased push for DEI policies, initiatives, and tangible actions within publishing companies, perhaps more members from diverse communities are asserting their identities because they feel as though publishing in Canada appears to be publicly holding itself to account for its incredible lack of diversity. Perhaps self-identification is also an act of witnessing that public calling to account and lack of responsiveness to community. The question is, I believe, whether it is a matter of changing for the sake of appearance, or whether true, community-based diversity work is being undertaken.

Across the board, the Summary of Results acknowledges that heads of publishing firms in Canada are still, practically without exception, nondiverse, showing almost no change from the 2018 report. Interns, in contrast, represent the highest diverse populations within publishing (and remember, for every paid internship at most publishing firms, there are one to two unpaid internships, meaning, on any given day at most large publishing houses, much of the diversity work is being done by unpaid or junior term-insecure diverse people). For anyone wishing to debate this point, it’s outlined in the Average Earnings section of this year’s report, along with the fact that those unpaid interns often receive an honorarium or an education credit (but not—emphasis my own—a living wage).

I am fully aware that the scope of this article allows me only a relative gloss of the results, but the results themselves don’t require extensive parsing. Publishing in Canada, though experiencing some forward momentum in regard to 2SLGBTQ+ and disabled presence, is still vastly nondiverse. Power is still held by a very particular established demographic. As the report itself acknowledges, in many publishing houses, the diversity work is almost entirely done on top of their daily jobs by those few BIPOC, 2SLGBTQ+, and disabled workers who may be present in these companies. Thus, when this load becomes too much, and these diverse colleagues cannot go on, the diversity work itself grinds to a halt—as there is apparently no strong drive to diversify if diverse people are not present.

I am aware, in the writing of this article, of the risks I take as a writer, teacher, and scholar who has a distinct part of my own identity rooted in each of the BIPOC, 2SLGBTQ+, and disabled communities. However, I am aware of my responsibilities to my communities, too. In pointing out the obvious in this year’s Diversity Baseline Survey, I, like all those engaged in necessary diversity work, open myself up to harm. It bears saying, and it bears holding in mind: the risk of calling out the failings of any system with regard to DEI is always the risk of harm, even though diversity work itself purports to be in the service of addressing existing harm. This harm is effectively doubled if you are from an underrepresented community.

Take this response in the spirit in which it is meant: a call to accountability, to visibility, to trust, and to reparative work. A part of that work involves stepping up and openly discussing the ongoing struggles and failures in the Canadian publishing industry to create and sustain diverse, equitable, and inclusive workspaces and publishing rosters. Being on the road to doing diversity work, as I have mentioned before, is one thing; refusing to poke heads above the parapet out of fear and anxiety that those grant-driven promises to anchor presses in DEI initiatives are not being followed through is another thing entirely. The same communities that publishers are purporting to equitably address in these initiatives are also paying attention to those companies who refuse to visibly step up, engage with, and follow through on DEI work.

It is a double bind when publishers are small: the funds for diversity work and the ability to diversify a company of perhaps one or two employees is different than the funding available and the larger roster of staff positions present in a company of 50+ employees. Much of the diversity work I have witnessed has been taking place in smaller publishing companies that are immediately situated within their home communities, likely in tiny local offices, and are more responsive/responsible to the local readerships that also buy the majority of the books they publish. These are also the companies with less access to funding for additional positions and initiatives. I see and respect the work being done by smaller publishers as they seek ways to diversify, and respect the rare executives from the larger publishing houses, too, who recognize and act to address the critical imbalances within their own companies. Recognition of the difficulties of DEI, however, does not excuse inertia. Right words need to be followed by right action, or the tendency is for things to stay precisely as they are. We may have desires and good hopes for change, but nothing actually changes.

Diversity work is vital work. Ultimately, the DBS presents a neat parcel of what reads as excuses as to why publishing in Canada is diversifying so slowly. Yes, there are indeed some good intentions and both smaller presses and larger publishers who recognize the crucial necessity of diversity, and to these I extend a warm hand of appreciation for the actions they are taking to move their presses forward and address historical failings. Overall, however, the statistics and the collated findings speak for themselves. In times of financial crisis, publishers are still opting to go with what’s easy instead of what’s right, and it’s easier to let DEI initiatives slide when there are so few overburdened diverse workers present that they cannot call out the companies on their staggering inertia—or are too worried for the safety of their jobs to try.

This, then, is the crucial work of allyship in publishing: to step forward and demand that publishing companies across the country are responsible to the diverse communities in which they are overwhelmingly located, and to the DEI initiatives that they have formed in order to appear acceptable to granting bodies. It is telling that most DEI initiatives noted in the report stall at the stage of being “something we keep in mind” or “an office policy,” rather than being widely understood and fundamentally enshrined in the bylaws and mandates of presses. This was the case with both of the presses (one academic and one literary) I consulted while writing this article (both of whom, after some discussion, remain nameless, which speaks to the pressing issue of accountability and visibility to community). In both cases, DEI initiatives were often presented as guidelines for press readers and office staff, rather than as foundational tenets on which the companies worked. Guidelines, or “things to keep in mind,” are all too easily sidestepped when they become inconvenient, too difficult to implement, or when the purse strings are tight.

The ways in which DEI initiatives or “guidelines” are enacted, too, speaks to diverse communities seeking safe places to publish sometimes challenging or exposing works. I would absolutely go so far as to suggest that DEI policies and initiatives that are added to presses as afterthoughts, rather than as enshrined commitments to diverse voices, actively discourage diverse communities from risking sharing their work. In one division of a western Canadian press I talked with, 6 out of 54 submissions this year came from BIPOC communities. I would argue that this speaks, among other things, to a direct correlation between add-on DEI policies and the perceptions of such presses as “safe places” for diverse narratives and communities. If I know that a press has a foundational principle of publishing diversely and holding itself to account in being inclusive of BIPOC, 2SLGBTQ+, and disabled communities (even if bylaws are rewritten to accomplish this), and that that press is actively pushing to diversify its board and its paid office staff (not just its unpaid interns), I will be far more likely to go through the potentially risky process of submitting writing to the press, knowing that it is committed to doing the work. A note in particular to academic presses: coming, as I do, from several underrepresented communities, I take mental notes of presses whose boards consist solely of those with doctorates, but who speak of their desire to publish diverse voices from many communities. In many cases, academia is still a hostile work environment for BIPOC, 2SLGBTQ+, and disabled people, and requiring all board members and press readers to hold PhDs is to fail to acknowledge the ongoing crisis of diversity still happening in post-secondary education across the country. These, too, are institutions struggling to act in ways that are grounded in, and responsible to, the needs of their diverse communities.

Critical diversity work is not a shiny tool to be flashed about for the purposes of checking boxes or securing operating grants. Behind the acronym of DEI, the work itself represents an ongoing community commitment to righting historical wrongs and recognizing and holding space for all voices in an industry that has been far too tightly controlled for far too long.

For more discussion about the results of 2022 Canadian Book Publishing Industry Diversity Baseline Survey, read publisher Matt Bowes’ response. 

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