A survey by the Cultural Diversity Network, a body comprising all the UK's big broadcasters that was set up in 2000 to promote diversity in the industry, found that the representation of ethnic minorities was above the national average. Almost 9 per cent of the on-screen population during peak hours came from ethnic minority groups, the survey found, compared with the national average of 7.8 per cent.

— The Guardian 12/11/05

Mark Thompson is getting tough over diversity. He is demanding that targets must be met for increasing the numbers of staff from ethnic minorities and with disabilities – and any director who fails to deliver will not get an annual bonus.

— Ariel (BBC staff newspaper) 17/1/06

Last year I interviewed more than 100 programme-makers working in different genres across the broadcasting industry to try to understand the barriers to cultural diversity in output. My findings suggest that simply playing colour by numbers through quotas and targets is, at best, of limited effectiveness and, at worst, may be an actual hindrance, particularly if it creates a misleading picture of progress.

For example, the sort of figures cited by the Cultural Diversity Network (CDN) above need to be viewed with care, especially if, as the report suggests, they give the impression that British ethnic minorities are over represented on television. (In fact, the figure of 9 per cent includes imported American programmes, which tend to have a higher number of ethnic minority actors.) On-screen casting quotas in recent years have undoubtedly led to a marked increase in the visibility of black and Asian faces on screen in certain programme genres, but there is still widespread dissatisfaction among audiences from ethnic minorities. This is because representation is about more than seeing on screen someone with the same skin colour as you.

Significant questions

The casting-quota approach largely treats people from minorities as being interchangeable and they often find themselves competing with each other. Few parts played by minority actors are culturally specific, but even when there is an attempt by white writers to acknowledge the cultural background of an ethnic minority character, it rarely rings true. So cultural diversity of perspectives remains rare and is largely restricted to issue-led stories, particularly about race or religion, which usually portray ethnic minorities as problematic. (The CDN's own website lists a range of what it regards as culturally diverse programmes and these are almost entirely about religion, terrorism and violence.)

There is clearly a need to develop a better shared understanding of what cultural diversity actually means in programmes. Monitoring content rather than simply skin colour would be a useful contribution to this. For example, how many hours of TV drama last year did writers from ethnic minorities originate? What subjects did they portray? How many prime-time documentaries were presented by people other than white middle-class, middle-aged men? How many different ethnic minority or disabled presenters featured on Radio 4 and on what range of programmes? Which programmes featured Muslims not in the context of terrorism? What stories involved black people talking about issues other than race, or disabled people talking about issues other than their disability? Such information might encourage broadcasters to think more carefully about the editorial choices they make, not only the casting ones.

The increase in visibility of black and brown faces on television has created an impression of great progress across the industry. But colour on screen does not necessarily reflect greater diversity behind. The employment figures the broadcasting organisations publicise do not give the information required to track diversity in the jobs that really matter: those where creative and editorial power lies. Although these figures are monitored, neither Channel 4 nor the BBC will reveal them. This lack of openness makes it difficult to see how much real progress is being made and where. If most ethnic minority staff at the BBC are working in the language sections of the World Service, or in finance or legal roles rather than production, how can the organisation be better equipped to reflect the diversity of Britain in its programmes?

From my interviewees' descriptions of their own workplaces, it became clear there are few areas in any broadcasting organisation today that have even a handful of ethnic minority people working as producers or in other editorial roles. There are many areas where there are none. This is particularly shocking given that, according to Ofcom, more than two-thirds of original British programmes are made in London, one of the most cosmopolitan cities in the world with more than 38 per cent of its workforce from an ethnic minority.

Lack of diversity in production offices and creative teams means that broadcasters are missing many opportunities to engage with diverse audiences in authentic and imaginative ways. My interviewees also gave many examples of the caution and ignorance that gets in the way of serving audiences effectively when it comes to dealing with stories about ethnic minorities.

People make assumptions about what is racist and what isn't. They're so scared of getting it wrong they don't want to touch it. We were offered a package about alleged witchcraft among the British African community and they didn't want to run it, whereas I could see it was a good piece of journalism and should go out. People think if you're talking about black people it's a race story. That's the filter. This wasn't, it was about child abuse. There's a fear of tackling issues.

— News producer

So how do you get an RT cover? Try getting to know Hudson's family. “One thing I often do when choosing covers is to stand back and say: ‘Does my brother know who that is? Will my mother care?' ”

— Media Guardian, 8/8/05

They're just talking to other people like themselves all the time. Diversity isn't part of their day-to-day normality so it's too easy to forget about it, however well-meaning they might be.

— Independent producer

Monitoring staff composition across different programme genres as a way of encouraging diversity is important, but only if the figures are made available to external scrutiny and demonstrate the detail of what is going on. For example, how many different ethnic minority people apply for jobs but don't get them compared with white applicants? For those who get in, what is their educational and regional background and how many are still in the industry 10 years later? How many have risen to senior levels? Such figures might reveal a more useful picture.

However, the assumption that simply meeting ethnic minority or disability employment targets will improve diversity of output is also flawed. Having a dark skin or a disability does not mean that you are necessarily equipped or inclined to make programmes about ethnicity or disability. Even if you do have the knowledge and desire to improve the representation of such groups it may not be easy. My ethnic minority and disabled interviewees gave many examples of how they felt the pressure to conform to the industry monoculture and the personal risks they faced in attempting to bring a different cultural perspective. A frequently-expressed sentiment was that being the lone minority voice trying to challenge the status quo was a certain route to madness.

So it is conceivable that the new employment targets will be met but there will be minimal impact on the output. The BBC, for example, says it has already met its original ethnic minority targets of 10 per cent for all staff and 4 per cent for senior managers. However, as Head of BBC Diversity Andrea Callender told me, this has not changed the culture of the organisation. She added:

The targets focused time and attention on the problem but targets haven't made it any easier for black and Asian people to sell a programme idea or made commissioning editors less risk-averse.

My research suggests there needs to be a critical mass of diversity in terms of class and life-experience, as much as in ethnicity or disability, to create production environments which are conducive to people readily sharing differing cultural knowledge. At the same time there needs to be a real commitment to diversity at every level of broadcasting, so people and ideas that increase the range of perspectives are favoured over those that don't. Without these fundamental culture changes we will continue to have a situation where many people from minorities come into the industry and leave again, feeling they don't fit and that their contribution is not valued.

In the course of my research I was frequently reminded of the Sufi story in which a man called Nasrudin is out at night on his hands and knees underneath a street lamp in front of his house. His neighbour comes by and asks what he's doing. “Looking for the key to my house,” says Nasrudin. So the neighbour gets down on his knees to help him look for it. After a while, when they still haven't found the key, the neighbour asks where exactly Nasrudin had dropped it. “Somewhere in my house,” he replies. “Well, why are you looking for it out here?” “Ah,” says Nasrudin, “there's more light out here.”

Sometimes we carry on looking in the wrong place for the key to a complex problem because it's less uncomfortable than pointing a searchlight where the solutions may actually be found. Is there a danger that the focus on colour by numbers is a similar distraction from tackling the real challenges of cultural diversity in broadcasting? Go figure.