It states that the countryside lacks “appropriate facilities to meet religious and cultural needs”, and does not cater for “dietary norms that are rooted in religious or cultural practice”, such as kosher and halal, adding to feelings of exclusion. To tackle “rural racism” and increase diversity, a series of recommendations are set out in a section of the report, How Can We Make the Countryside More Inclusive?
The report notes that “the availability of halal food or spaces for prayer could make a significant difference in whether people feel comfortable visiting the countryside”.
It states that rural businesses should adapt to improve “cultural sensitivity”, saying: “Welcoming minoritized individuals into the countryside means more than tolerance; it requires thoughtful adaptation, sustained inclusion efforts and a willingness to change.”
These suggestions mark the conclusion of a two-year project led by Prof Neil Chakraborty, Leicester’s Hate Studies lead, along with his colleagues Amy Clarke and Prof Corinne Fowler.
Prof Fowler assisted the National Trust’s controversial 2021 report into the colonial connections of its country houses. Rural Racism Project: Towards an Inclusive Countryside was funded by the Leverhulme Trust, a charity established by William Lever, the first Viscount Leverhulme, the plantation-owning soap magnate behind Unilever. The report sets out strategies to improve inclusion, including policies that would “include racialized minorities as part of a broader rural regeneration strategy”.
One contributor to the report, which is based on interviews and “informal conversations” with 115 people, suggests that “you could revive rural communities by bringing in more diverse communities” The report claims that the “rural racism” such recommendations are intended to tackle is in part driven by fear and “resistance to demographic changes”. It states that these changes are often “framed as a threat to the stable and enduring norm of rural identity”, rather than “being recognized as a process of enrichment”.
In addition to the physical impact of the white population and the lack of religious facilities, the report also claims that participants in the Rural Racism Project experienced ill-treatment in the form of microaggressions and in open displays of prejudice. These included “persistent and aggressive staring, hostile body language and deliberate isolation, as well as… more overtly threatening behaviors such as name-calling, racial slurs, physical intimidation and threats”.
The report, which opens with a trigger warning, states that “most participants felt that racism in rural England is getting worse” and that the rural British “monoculture” could contribute to developing far-Right sentiment, as opposed to the diversity found in cities.
The conclusions drawn from interviews with 115 people were challenged by the Countryside Alliance, which branded the authors’ work as “collating anecdotes”.
Tim Bonner, chief executive of the Countryside Alliance, told The Telegraph: “We would never downplay any individual act of racism, which must be confronted wherever it arises, but the narrative that rural communities are inherently more racist than urban ones is just nonsense.
“Recent government hate crime statistics show an inverse relationship between rurality and racist hate crimes.”
He added: “The suggestion that racism is so pronounced in rural areas as to justify continual special attention is therefore not supported by the evidence, which may explain why this study has shied away from examining data in favor of collating anecdotes.
“Ironically, those who peddle the narrative of a racist countryside are actually showing their own prejudice against rural people.”
The report comes after the British countryside was branded a “racist, colonial” white space by a number of wildlife charities.
Wildlife and Countryside Link, a charity umbrella group, made the claim in 2024 in evidence provided to Parliament.
MPs were informed that the British countryside has been influenced by “racist colonial legacies”, which have created an environment some fear is “dominated by white people”.
Following a rehanging of its collection in 2024, the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge suggested that paintings of the British countryside could evoke dark “nationalist feelings”. The museum, owned by the University of Cambridge, added new signage stating that pictures of “rolling English hills” can stir feelings of “pride towards a homeland”.
