Summary: Part III: The Way Out and Conclusion 

Chapter 7: The Comfort of Home 

Eberhardt’s focus in Part III is the mitigation of bias—specifically, of its ill effects on racial politics in the United States. She begins Chapter 7 with an incident that, to her, seemed harmless enough: a white preschooler sees Eberhardt’s infant son and is surprised and delighted to have seen “a brown baby.” Aware that the little girl has likely not seen many Black people, Eberhardt finds the episode “cute and funny,” but the girl’s mother is “mortified” and hurries away. 

Although the girl’s unfamiliarity with “brown” people is unsurprising, Eberhardt recognizes that it reflects a broader pattern of residential segregation that has existed in the United States for centuries. She reviews the federal government’s role in first directly sponsoring, then legally defending, and ultimately tolerating segregated housing in the 20th century. A consequence of this is that many Americans have come to associate Black people with poor neighborhoods and poorly maintained properties. This perpetuates a vicious cycle in which, for instance, white Americans are less likely to choose to live in “black spaces” because of assumptions about the safety and cleanliness of those neighborhoods. A similar vicious cycle, Eberhardt notes, concerns other segregated populations such as immigrants. Historically, the lines of segregation were especially rigid in the American South, where the racial hierarchy was policed through lynching and other acts of terror. Eberhardt describes her grandfather’s escape from this environment as a participant in the Great Migration. 

Eberhardt then turns to two contemporary companies that play a role in the US housing ecosystem: the neighborhood social platform Nextdoor and the rental marketplace Airbnb. Both, she observes, have struggled with discriminatory behavior and biased remarks on the part of some of their users. She describes how, with her consultation, Nextdoor instituted a policy for “suspicious person” reports that drastically reduced instances of racial profiling. Airbnb likewise responded to discrimination among hosts by enacting a required “community commitment” for its users. Speaking with Laura Murphy, the attorney who helped Airbnb draft its policy, Eberhardt learns that “unconscious bias” is a bigger contributing factor than “blatant bigotry.” 

Chapter 8: Hard Lessons 

This chapter is framed by the experiences of Bernice Donald, a Mississippi native who was one of the first Black teenagers to attend an integrated school in her town. Eberhardt describes the discriminatory treatment meted out to Bernice by students and teachers alike, and she notes that merely having people of different races in the same school does not cure prejudice. Instead, Eberhardt argues that interracial contact can only ameliorate prejudice when it occurs among people treated as equals by those in authority. Bernice’s experiences on a school trip to New York—where she and all the other students were “outsiders”—serve as an example of how a common struggle can cultivate a sense of equality and togetherness. At the end of the chapter, Bernice returns as Judge Donald, a federal appellate judge who is one of her former high school’s greatest success stories. She says she has forgiven the teachers who mistreated her, but the hurtfulness of their actions lingers. 

In between, Eberhardt fast-forwards to her own experiences in a majority-white high school, where her art teacher stood up for her against a bigoted fellow faculty member. She tells, too, of her son Harlan’s experience with a school administrator who was enforcing the school’s dress code in a biased way. Eberhardt describes her decision to meet with the administrator as a “risk” for all involved but an ultimately worthwhile one. More broadly, however, she points out that uneven application of school disciplinary policies remains a problem nationwide. She suggests, too, that the persistence of residential segregation and the rise of charter schools have eroded some of the gains made over the past 50 years. In this environment, she says, it is especially important for teachers to offer “wise feedback” that shows their criticism comes from a place of high expectations, not hostility or bias. 

Chapter 9: Higher Learning 

Chapter 9 focuses on the Charlottesville “Unite the Right” rally of 2017, which turned the University of Virginia campus into “ground zero for a newly visible white supremacy movement.” Surveying the political climate that led up to the rally, Eberhardt describes the opposition to the removal of a statue of Confederate general Robert E. Lee. She describes the fear and sorrow felt by Jewish students and students of color as their college town became the scene of a white nationalist march, the dismay of white Southerners at the bigotry of their neighbors, and the helplessness of those trying to restore order. The “summer of hate” had lingering effects on teaching at UVA, where professors found themselves walking a fine line between promoting free speech and defusing personal confrontations. 

Chapter 10: The Bottom Line 

Finally, Eberhardt examines the effects of bias on the employment prospects of different racial groups. She reports experiments in which job applicants with “black-sounding names” were less likely to obtain a callback or an interview. This leads to a widespread practice of “whitening,” in which Black and Asian applicants, among others, use nicknames or initials, emphasize stereotypically white extracurriculars and pastimes, and otherwise avoid drawing attention to their racial identity. Again, studies show that “whitening” one’s application materials increases the chance of a callback from a prospective employer. The interview process often contains substantial biases of its own, and gender bias plays its own significant role in hiring and promotions. The practice of “blind auditioning” in the world of orchestral music circumvents these biases, but this does not solve the broader problem of how performers are judged by the audience. 

Eberhardt describes the real but limited value of formal training in keeping workplaces on guard against implicit bias, citing the example of Starbucks’ response to a widely publicized 2018 bias incident. Still, Eberhardt observes, “implicit bias can be layered and complicated,” and companies sometimes seek bias training to boost their public image rather than to improve their treatment of employees and customers. She argues that taking a slower, more objective approach to hiring and promotion decisions—emphasizing concrete skills and achievements as opposed to vague personal traits—can help neutralize the impact of bias. Likewise, careful monitoring of decision-making can surface biased patterns before they grow worse. Strong personal connections at work further lead people to treat one another as individuals, not stereotypes. Ultimately, Eberhardt offers no simple answer: she notes that implicit bias is challenging to recognize and fight, but she maintains that we have a duty to do so.  

Conclusion 

The last few pages of Biased begin with an episode from one of Eberhardt’s police training sessions. She tells of the frustration of a police officer who, though himself Black, was viewed with distrust by the predominantly Black community he sought to serve. This erosion of trust, Eberhardt says, is part of the cost of bias: “when people feel they are being treated unjustly, they aren’t likely to cooperate” even with those who want to help. This, along with the other injustices documented in the book, makes addressing bias “not just a personal choice” but “a social agenda, a moral stance.”

Analysis: Part III: The Way Out and Conclusion 

Part III makes the case that frank conversations about racial bias are necessary even though they may be difficult and awkward. As the brief episode in Chapter 7 shows, many people view acknowledgment of racial differences as impolite or ignorant. As Eberhardt shows, race is a factor in contemporary society whether we choose to “see” it or not; indeed, “not seeing race” often means overlooking discrimination. Sometimes, it is indeed possible to take race out of the picture, as when Airbnb guests are allowed to “instant book” a property. More often, however, the way forward is to acknowledge racial differences and try to create policies that actively avoid bias. The school dress code incident in Chapter 8 underscores the fact that people in positions of authority may not even realize they are being biased in the rules they make and enforce. Eberhardt makes a similar point in her discussion of Airbnb and Nextdoor in Chapter 7: people often behave in biased ways not because they are bigots but because they lack self-awareness about their own unconscious biases. Thus, explicitly noting the potential for bias is an important part of her recommendation for moving forward. 

Despite the surge of white supremacism described in Chapter 9, Eberhardt maintains that US society is making progress overall in rejecting explicit bias and overt racism. Public displays of bigotry are increasingly unacceptable to many Americans. However, Eberhardt warns against growing complacent: even as cultural attitudes change, implicit bias remains below the surface. Moreover, because bias is a feature of human cognition, it cannot be completely prevented. Instead, continual vigilance is necessary to ensure that bias does not translate to unfair outcomes in schools, the workplace, and society at large.