Racial Inequality, Racism, and Racial Change (3/21)

1
Racial Inequality, Racism, and Racial Change
(3/21)

• Complete Policy
• ArmyNavy and what can be done?
• What forces and policies influence race relations
  in what ways?

2
Is there race inequality of opportunity (review)

• Is the playing field level.
• Some people believe it is more than level.
• The text (e.g. p. 440 Top dog or Underdog)
  suggests this is mistaken.
• Feagin argues that discriminatory treatment and
  stereotyping is pervasive in the US today,
• As measured by thousands of matched pair
  applications for housing, employment, etc.

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4 The Myth that nothing can be done

• There are not only huge shifts in attitudes,
• But also large differences and relatively rapid
  changes in different institutions.
• The army went from largely vertically segregated
  to the most integrated large institution in the
  US in decades.
• The process was similar to that pictured in
  Remember the Titans

4
The problem in the army and other armed forces

• The problem was that vertical segregation was
  divisive, dysfunctional and unjust.
• Incoming candidates differed in test scores, so
  that if those scores to determined placement
  vertical segregation was assured.
• Are the test score differences innate or due to
  differences in schools, etc.?
• The army argued that there was evidence of the
  latter, and if so it is unjust as well as
  inefficient to accommodate to it.

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Nature of army programs

• A set of four main compensatory programs.
• None insures one a position, only a chance.
• They are not aimed to replace the educational
  system, but to remedy the cumulative racial
  inequality.

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The army and the navy, again.

• Feagin does not believe that the army is any more
  utopian than the navy.
• Nor were the average sentiments of either most
  people or most officers different.
• The main difference was a commitment by the
  leadership to a sufficient set of policies
  directed at both inequality and prejudice.

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Are race relations and race inequality stable,
unstable or hyperstable?

• Call a structure stable if it changes a little
  if a small force is placed on it, and it changes
  a lot of a large force is applied.
• Structures without feedbacks are often stable.
• Call a structure unstable if it changes a lot
  even when only a small force is applied.
• Positive feedback structures are often unstable
• Call a structure hyper-stable if, even after it
  has been changed, it tends to change back.
• Negative feedback structures are often
  hyper-stable.

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The three marbles, again
stable
unstable
Hyper-stable
Which dynamic describes racism and racial
inequality? Why?
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Myrdal believed that race relations were unstable.

• They have lots of positive feedbacks.
• A decrease in prejudice should create an
  avalanche of further changes unraveling the
  racist structure.
• Just as an increase in racial inequality should
  create an avalanche of further changes increasing
  racism.
• (Note that both happened in the 1970s)
• Moreover it is part of a larger system.
• Changes in the economy were undermining Jim Crow.
• Changes in the whole society were making Southern
  regionalism less viable.
• Changes in the world were making US failure to
  live up to its ideals less viable.
• The structure of positive feedbacks that brought
  it about, would cause the whole system to unravel.

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Implications of his analysis of racial inequality
as positive feedbacks

• The structure looks inert because and only
  because it is so pervasive.
• But policy interventions can be very powerful
  because change is amplified.
• However they must be broad spectrum (I.e. health,
  education, political power, income, wealth,
  social participation, etc.

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Feagins view We are at a fork in the road

• 2 Contradictory dynamics responding to the coming
  minority majority in different ways
• Increasing separatism and coercion
• Gated communities
• The Brazilian solution.
• A broad coalition to build inclusive citizenship
  and true democracy
• Without justice, there cannot be peace

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The relation between individual attitudes and
social dynamics

• Individual actions society, but in many
  different ways.
• Society individual attitudes and
  behaviors, , but in many different ways.
• Pettigrew calls the assumption that a racist
  society is one that contains a lot of prejudiced
  individuals a failure to keep our levels
  straight or to think in systems terms

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Housing segregation and tipping points

• A striking and well-understood example involves
  housing segregation.
• Suppose that when some black families move into
  a neighborhood, all the white families move out.
  Does that mean that all the white families are
  motivated by prejudice?
• Even ignoring the institutionalized policies of
  banks, real estate agents and developers,
  schools, or politicians, imagine a distribution
  of attitudes as follows

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White willingness to live in neighborhoods of
varying mix
Suppose the following mix of attitudes 19 favor
an integrated neighborhood and will remain, so
long as they are not the only whites in the
neighborhood.  20 favor an integrated
neighborhood and will remain, so long as it
remains 50 or more white. 20 favor an
integrated neighborhood and will remain, so long
as no more than 1/3 of the residents are
nonwhite. 20 favor an integrated neighborhood
and will remain, so long as it does not become
more nonwhite than the country as a whole (i.e.
so long as it is less than 20 non-white) 20
favor an integrated neighborhood and will remain,
so long as they do not observe other families
moving out. 1 oppose a integrated neighborhoods
and will move out if any non-whites move in. What
is the dynamic that results?
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White flight

•    If the institutional rule is that each family
  makes an independent decision, and if there are
  no social policies that produce
  counter-pressures, then
• the move of the one percent that oppose
  integration in principle will cause
• the next 20 of white families to move out,
• which will cause the next 20 of white families
  to move out,
• and so on, leading to an all black neighborhood.
• Another way of looking at it is as a
  self-reinforcing stampede of white flight.

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Does the outcome reflect wishes?

• In one sense, by definition the outcome reflects
  wishes (as well as institutional arrangements.)
• But by assumption, 99 of the population prefers
  an integrated neighborhood.
• And the unwillingness of, for example, the last
  20 to live in an almost all-black neighborhood
  may have nothing to do with prejudice.
• The outcome dynamic is the same as that which
  would result if all white families wanted to
  avoid contact with any black families.
• But what would have to be changed to change the
  dynamic is very different.

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Within a decade, Jim Crow had been dismantled.
Why did so little change in attitudes
inequality and social relations result?

• On the one hand, the dismantling of Jim Crow is
  not little. Some people even argue that the
  playing field is level today (a position that
  Feagin and the text both contest).
• On the other hand, many structures of inequality
  and segregation have remained, and have even
  grown over the past 20 years.

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Theory 1 Deeply rooted sentiments

• Some people suggest that attitudes about race are
  socialized early and resistant to change.
• But many attitudes appeared to change quite
  rapidly
• The army
• Bennington
• Remember the Titans

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Theory 2 The new racism

• Some people suggest that public acceptability
  merely made racism take the form of cultural
  stereotypes rather than genetic theories
• symbolic racism using code terms of crime in
  the streets, welfare, or political
  correctness
• sense of group position that whites merely
  shifted to whatever policies were most likely to
  maintain their advantages.
• laissez faire racism that the positions most
  likely to maintain white advantage were
  individualism and limitation of government policy

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Theory 3 countervailing forces

• An unstable system can amplify either an increase
  or decrease of either racial inequality or racial
  prejudice.
• Civil rights instituted a beneficent cycle
• Deindustrialization, globalization, and
  government cutbacks instituted a vicious cycle.
• Which increased inequality in the black community
  and cancelled each other out.

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Theory 4 Backlash

• The erosion of privileges (or perceived, relative
  privilege)of some whites produced
  counter-movements and counter-policies,
• and the majority of whites were not willing to
  take sides.

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My own personal view

• I (Peter Knapp) have argued that there are
  evidently countervailing pressures
• Both forces are demonstrable,
• And inequality in the black community has
  increased.
• See the Symposium in Contemporary Sociology
  (26314-7 1997)
• but that sociology often has difficulty
  estimating how large are the effects of such
  countervailing feedbacks,
• and that is one of the reasons for developing
  more systemic theories.

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The continued decline of prejudiced attitudes in
the US
RAC PRES say they would vote for a candidate
of the other race, if their party nominated
him. Intermar oppose laws against the marriage
of blacks and whites.
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The lack of trend on policy
B LACK believe that the government is doing
too little to improve the life chances of
blacks. HELP BLACK strongly agree that the
government should help blacks overcome the
effects of past discrimination.
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The effect of Jim Crow racism (or race prejudice)
on HELP BLACK
INTERMAR.? by GOV.BLACK GOVT.HELP AGR.
W/BOTH NO SPECIAL Missing TOTAL YES 245 489 1259
4321 1993 12.3 24.5 63.2
100.0 NO 1564 2339 3601 11675 7504 20.8 31
.2 48.0 100.0 Missing 1641 2549 4445 3281
11916 TOTAL 1809 2828 4860 19277 94
97 19.0 29.8 51.2
A small fraction of the population opposes
intermarriage, and they are only 8 less likely
to support govt aid to blacks.
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Another measure of Jim Crow racism (or race
prejudice) Re HELP BLACK
RACE DIF2 by GOV.BLACK GOVT.HELP AGR.W
/BOTH NO SPECIAL Missing TOTAL YES 169 305 684
1281 1158 14.6 26.3 59.1
100.0 NO 1155 1964 3001 6398 6120 18.9 32.
1 49.0 100.0 Missing 2126 3108 5620 11598
22452 TOTAL 1324 2269 3685
Only a small fraction of the population believes
that blacks have less inborn ability to learn,
and they are only 4 less likely to believe the
government should do more to help.
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The effect of new racism (or belief in less
motivation) on HELP BLACK
RACE DIF4 by GOV.BLACK GOVT.HELP AGR.W
/BOTH NO SPECIAL Missing TOTAL YES 458 1063 2467
4212 3988 11.5 26.7 61.9
100.0 NO 840 1120 1169 3299 3129 26.8 35.
8 37.4 100.0 Missing 2152 3194 5669 1176
6 2278 TOTAL 1298 2183 3636
A substantial fraction of the population says
that blacks have less motivation and will power,
and they are substantially less likely (12 vs.
27) to support government help.
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The effect of belief in discrimination) on HELP
BLACK
RACE DIF1 by GOV.BLACK GOVT.HELP AGR.W
/BOTH NO SPECIAL Missing TOTAL YES 962 1102 930
3221 2994 32.1 36.8 31.1
100.0 NO 352 1106 2751 4380 4209 8.4 26.3
65.4 100.0 Missing 2136 3169 5624 11676
22605 TOTAL 1314 2208 3681 19277 7203 18.2 3
0.7 51.1 A substantial minority of the
population says that blacks have less income,
etc. because of discrimination, and they are
substantially more likely (32 vs. 8) to support
government help.