An elderly Chinese woman, punched on the streets of San Francisco. A Filipino-American woman , kicked and stomped on near Times Square. A Chinese man who collected scrap for a living, left in coma after an attack in Harlem. These are just the tip of an iceberg of abuses against the Asian diaspora in the United States, and of the vitriol and ignominious prejudices harboured towards vulnerable migrants across the West, already disenfranchised and alienated from mainstream political discourse. To put it bluntly, these are tough times to be Asian in the West. With political figures dog-whistling phrases such as “kung flu” and “Chinese virus” , and the increasingly bipartisan neo-McCarthyism aimed at Chinese scholars, students and migrant workers, it is no surprise the US has become a deeply hostile environment for anyone who looks Asian. It is tempting to characterise racism as the fault of a few malignant individuals, especially as the Covid-19 pandemic has brought out the worst in many. Yet the entrenched racism in the West towards East Asians – including the Chinese diaspora – is in fact the product of structural failures and injustices. The Asian community in the US has long suffered from exclusion. From the 1875 Page Act and 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act , to the internment of over 120,000 Japanese Americans during World War II, and the 1950s witch-hunts for Communist sympathisers, East Asians have been viewed as outsiders, enemies and inimical to the American spirit. The arcane and unjust laws have been repealed but the underlying ethos persists throughout wider society. A US appeals court last year upheld the ruling that Harvard University, despite assigning Asian-Americans poorer “personal ratings” than white applicants, did not discriminate against them. Asian-Americans are seen as a highly successful model minority. Indeed, according to the 2017 census, 74.1 per cent of the Taiwanese and 72.8 per cent of the Korean populations in the US possess a bachelor’s degree or higher educational qualification, compared with 31.9 per cent of the European/white population and 56.6 per cent of the British population. But educational success does not always translate to higher earnings. According to the same census, for example, the average household income of Korean families is US$58,573, compared with US$70,037 for British migrants, and US$59,653 for the European/white population. There are many reasons for the discrepancy between educational attainment and job success. But race remains a factor: a study has found that Asians remain the least likely population group to be promoted to management or senior executive positions in American companies. We are born to serve, not to lead – so the narrative goes. The dangerous myth that Asian-Americans “have it easier” because of their industrious work ethic and studious culture erases the suffering and predicaments of Asian migrants, past and present. Asian-Americans have historically refrained from demanding redress for structural inequalities, their silence taken as carte blanche for governmental inaction. The view that Asians are born successful, in privileged conditions, renders those who buckle under the weight of socio-economic exclusion and cultural appropriation unwilling to speak out. This trope is partially fuelled by opportunistic politicians, including conservatives who wield Asian successes and academic merits to attack the interests of non-Asian minorities. Former president Donald Trump repeatedly accused Asian migrants of stealing American jobs. Divide-and-conquer remains a popular tactic. Diverse Oscars: Hollywood has more work to do in stopping Asian hate Yet the way we engage in, or refrain from, conversations about prejudices towards Asians is underpinned by a lack of political representation. This is true not just in the US. In Britain, for example, just 0.7 per cent of the population is ethnically Chinese, according to the latest 2011 survey. This percentage has almost certainly increased since, but there is only one sitting Chinese Lord and one Chinese MP in Westminster, out of, respectively, 791 and 650 members. That is little over 0.1 per cent of the total number of peers and MPs. Similarly, Asian-Americans are under-represented in US national politics, despite being an increasingly prominent part of the supporter base for the Democratic Party. Few cabinet officials are Asian in origin. Kamala Harris made history as the first black and Asian-American vice-president. One can only hope she is not an isolated case of success, but a herald of more promising changes. I have spent more than six years at Oxford University, one of the most endowed and prestigious in the world, seen as a place where progressive and egalitarian ideals flourish. Yet I, too, have been subject to rampant, unabashed racism. What hit me hardest, perhaps, was the onslaught of anti-Chinese abuse after Covid-19 broke out last year. I can vividly remember being told to “**** off back to China” and being called “ Wuhan virus ” on the streets of London. It did not shake me fundamentally for I had always seen myself as an international student from Hong Kong. I can only imagine how hard this deluge of racism must be for those who have made their home in and fought for a country whose people now refuse to recognise them as one of their own. Brian YS Wong is a DPhil in Politics candidate at Balliol College, Oxford, a Rhodes Scholar (Hong Kong 2020) and the founding editor-in-chief of the Oxford Political Review