Discrimination refers to the unfair treatment of people because they possess certain traits, features or characteristics. Such like features include age, gender, race, disability, religion, pregnancy and maternity, sexual orientation, gender reassignment and marriage and civil partnership (Schniedewind & Davidson, 2006). Discrimination can occur both at an individual and at an institutional level. Individual discrimination ensues when a person treats another negatively, based on the traits that they consider undesirable, mostly out of plainly biased feelings against the person that bears them. This type of discrimination primarily emanates from an issue between individuals and can thus, be very easily resolved. On the other hand, institutional discrimination, which tends to be more consequential, is most often deeply rooted in faulty systems of social governance that are therefore, oddly stacked against the group that gets discriminated against.
Although both types of discrimination are intended to subject individuals to undue harm, they are perpetrated in very different ways. Whilst individual discrimination highlights the subjective actions of an individual or of a small group of individuals on another/others, as for example, a white police officer treating a black person unfairly by beating him up, institutional discrimination refers to the unfair treatment of a person(s), by subjecting him to systems that would have been set up to not serve his/her interests. The latter occurs at a broader level and affects large groups of people, and may include an institution refusing to employ people on the basis of their sexual orientation. This not only affects the rejected persons but their acquaintances and confidants as well.
Delegate your assignment to our experts and they will do the rest.
Both individual and institutional forms of discrimination go against the universal laws of justice, fairness, and equality, and should therefore be discouraged. However, quite unlike individual discrimination, institutional discrimination negatively impacts on the society as a whole, and is therefore more distasteful to me as an individual (Farrante, 2007). This is because institutions have greater power in terms of ensuring social order. They are used to institute punishments in just as well as rewards, depending on the desirability of action. They also provide people with resources, material goods, opportunities, security, and psychological satisfactions. Thus, institutional discrimination, in the event that it becomes socially entrenched, disrupts the major facets around which life is organized, causing a disruption of social activities. Further, whilst individual discrimination can be dealt with by compelling the perpetrator to act differently or face punishment, institutional discrimination is hard to deal with as it tends to be built into social structures, effectively meaning that its effect(s) will take a longer duration to be exterminated and in some cases, cannot be resolved.
References
Farrante, J. (2007). Sociology: A Global Perspective . Cengage Learning
Schniedewind, N. & Davidson, E. (2006). Open Minds: A Source Book of Learning Activities to Affirm Diversity and Promote Equality . Rethinking Schools
