Exposing the racial wealth divide in South Africa and the UK

The COVID-19 pandemic and the cost-of-living crisis have exposed the stark inequalities between those with large asset piles and wealth, who can ride out the economic storms, compared to those navigating debts and with no assets of any kind to offer any kind of safety cushion. It is not sufficiently realised that these divides are hugely racialised. We

We extend recent initiatives to analyse the stark racial wealth gap which exists across in many nations. In the UK, the Runnymede Trust’s 2020 The Colour of Money report pointed to systematic racial inequalities in the UK, with white Bangladeshi and Black African households having only 10% of the average wealth of white British households. Mike Savage’s collaborations with South African and UK based researchers exploring how the racial wealth divide is experienced and perceived across differing racialised communities has encouraged considerable debate and interest. A feature of this work is the use of peer-based community research methods, so that the voices of marginalised communities are heard, and in a way which helps to empower such groups to reflect on and mobilise on the research findings. We have conducted qualitative research which extend perspectives on this ‘racial wealth divide’ and will lead to collaborative publication. 

We work closely with colleagues in South Africa and have championed the use of geometric data analysis methods, previously largely confined to the study of inequality in European nations, to South Africa, where they reveal stark features of racialised wealth divides. We are interested in building on recent scholarship which links racial wealth gaps to the long-term history of colonialism and slavery, and their long-term legacies. We also seek to consider how these are marked in the contemporary understandings of wealth and consider how far different groups root these in the colonial past and appropriation.

Forthcoming, ‘Colonial Pasts and Inequality Today: the Racial Wealth Divide in the UK and South Africa’, LSE Press 2026.

Bukata, E., Mahmoudzadeh, M. Oliver, A., Savage, S. 2025. Why the UK racial wealth divide matters: A call for action. The Runnymede Trust. 

Branson, N., Hjellbrekke, J., Leibbrandt, M., Ranchhod, V., Savage, M. and Whitelaw, E., 2024. The socioeconomic dimensions of racial inequality in South Africa: A social space perspective. The British Journal of Sociology, 75(4), pp.613-635.

Professor Mike Savage, (Professor, International Inequalities Institute, LSE)

Esiri Bukata, (Research Assistant, International Inequalities Institute, LSE)

Professor Neil Cummins, (Professor of Economic History, Department of Economic History, LSE)

Dr Eleni Karagiannaki, Associate Professorial Research Fellow, Centre for the Analysis of Social Exclusion, LSE

Dr George Kunnath,(Assistant Professorial Research Fellow, International Inequalities Institute, LSE)

Mina Mahmoudzadeh, (Research Assistant, International Inequalities Institute, LSE)

Babette May,(PhD student, Department of Sociology, LSE)

Adele Oliver, (PhD researcher, University of Glasgow / Project Support Assistant, III)

Dr Annalena Oppel, (LSE Fellow in Inequalities, LSE)