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Notes -
There's not really any evidence either way. So I will default to 'they chose them for normal acting reasons' not that they chose her as a diversity hire.
The actor they thought would do the best job representing the character that they wanted to depict. Presumably whether they were white or black was neither here nor here in terms what they envisioned for the character.
Why should perfect physical representation of the character described necessarily be a goal? Why not cast a black actor if you thought they were the best, was race ever a factor in the original fairytale?
Race was a factor in so far that in the vaguely-defined epoch in which the fairytale is set, Danish princes didn't commonly marry black women, so a black Ariel would be out of place for reasons unrelated to the original fairy tale.
But why stop at race? Is age or sex a factor in the original fairytale? Let's make Ariel an old man played by Robert de Niro; he's a great actor, arguably objectively better than Halle Bailey, and if you oppose the idea of a young Danish prince falling in love with an older man, you're an ageist homophobe. So you'd be okay with swapping Halle Bailey with Robert de Niro, right? Or if not, why not?
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