DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10892-025-09520-0

Abstract: Discrimination is typically understood to be either direct or indirect. However, we argue that some cases that clearly are instances of discrimination are neither direct nor indirect. This is not just a logical taxonomical point. Highly salient, contemporary cases of algorithmic discrimination – a form of discrimination which was not around (or, at least, not conspicuously so) when the distinction between direct and indirect discrimination was originally articulated – are best construed as a third form of discrimination – non-direct discrimination, we shall call it. If we are right, the dominant dichotomous distinction between direct and indirect discrimination should be replaced by our tripartite distinction between direct, indirect, and non-direct discrimination. We show how non-direct discrimination covers not only important types of algorithmic discrimination, but also allows us to make sense of some instances of implicit bias discrimination.