Race

The New Republic's John Judis has an instructive piece on race in American politics today. This part about how Obama can overcome racial resentment has some bearing on the poverty and inequality debate.

Can Obama surmount these obstacles? If the strong version of Mendelberg's thesis is correct, then the very fact that Obama is African American will undercut any appeals to racial fears or resentments. And, if elections were held in the manner of the Iowa caucus, where voters publicly debate their positions and where Obama won substantial white working class support, then Mendelberg's stronger thesis might well prove true. But elections are held in the privacy of a voting booth, where a voter can give voice to fears and resentments without danger of being heard. Obama may be able to sway some white voters to his side by drawing attention to race, but probably not enough to fully compensate for the disadvantage he faces.

If addressing racial resentments directly is not the answer, what is? As Mendelberg also suggests, it's changing the subject--doing what the Republicans of the 1870s and the Democrats of the 1990s did. This year, that means diverting voters' attention from the politics of race to the plight of the economy and the continuing quagmire in Iraq.

In the end, the lesson of political psychology for Democrats is not to avoid nominating black candidates. It is simply to understand that America's racial history continues to influence the calculations of voters--sometimes near the forefronts of their minds, sometimes in the deep recesses of their unconscious. For liberals, acknowledging these obstacles is the first step to blunting them.

Similarly, just having the discussion about "the poor" and what their obligations are is a minefield. Like clockwork the conversation turns to how to motivate poor people to become less dependent. Government programs are put on defense. Why? The reality is, a huge population believes in the racist and individualistic idea that the poor are shiftless, and there are limits to the utility of calling out racism and selfishness for what it is. Changing the subject to the economy, opportunity and security for all, and/or national solidarity are necessary and complimentary ways to go.

There are justifiable fears that those frames, however, are too narrow. Every frame should be examined for what it includes and excludes. If it excludes policy that's desired and viable, it's not worth it. But what viable policies would be excluded? Policies that are perceived as too targeted might not fit, but these are the same policies that frames being used now have failed to move on the national stage.

I would concede that the poverty frame is more inclusive behind the scenes. Targeted programs are viable if the action stays where a poverty frame may still do some good. Indeed, many targeted programs by their very nature are small enough to not require national mobiliatization and persuasion. This is where the anti-poverty world is at its best- this is what it was built to do.

Certain popular programs also don't seem to need to be reframed. SCHIP and the minimum wage, for example, can receive national attention and be extremely popular. Last year, when these policies were more or less the Democratic domestic agenda, no real attempt to reframe the debate proved necessary.

But in general, the poverty frame is far more exclusive on the national stage. Policy will not reach scale unless inequality and poverty become national issues once again. But if we bring social problems into the light of day, we have to grapple with the racial divide and American individualism- two extremely powerful ideas that militate towards retrenchment and perserving the status quo, and that the poverty frame reinforces.

Like Obama on race, we will have to change the subject so we're not talking about individualism or race. It's probably no secret that I like FDR and Obama's language the best but there are many other options.

With all the blog commentary since yesterday about the Obama speech on race, I don't have much to add, but I did want to excerpt my favorite two paragraphs:

For the African-American community, that path [to a more perfect union] means embracing the burdens of our past without becoming victims of our past. It means continuing to insist on a full measure of justice in every aspect of American life. But it also means binding our particular grievances – for better health care, and better schools, and better jobs - to the larger aspirations of all Americans -- the white woman struggling to break the glass ceiling, the white man whose been laid off, the immigrant trying to feed his family. And it means taking full responsibility for own lives – by demanding more from our fathers, and spending more time with our children, and reading to them, and teaching them that while they may face challenges and discrimination in their own lives, they must never succumb to despair or cynicism; they must always believe that they can write their own destiny.

....

In the white community, the path to a more perfect union means acknowledging that what ails the African-American community does not just exist in the minds of black people; that the legacy of discrimination - and current incidents of discrimination, while less overt than in the past - are real and must be addressed. Not just with words, but with deeds – by investing in our schools and our communities; by enforcing our civil rights laws and ensuring fairness in our criminal justice system; by providing this generation with ladders of opportunity that were unavailable for previous generations. It requires all Americans to realize that your dreams do not have to come at the expense of my dreams; that investing in the health, welfare, and education of black and brown and white children will ultimately help all of America prosper.

I particularly like the line in the first paragraph about "binding our particular grievances ... to the larger aspirations of all Americans", and the line in the second paragraph about how "investing in the health, welfare, and education of black and brown and white children will ultimately help all of America prosper." More than fine sentiments, these add up to a prescription for building community power.

I'm not taking sides, but this is a thoughtful op-ed making the case that it's time to "retire the term African-American and go back to black."

Distinguishing between American black people based on their ancestors’ arrival date ignores the continuum of experience that transcends borders and individual genealogies and unites black people all over the world.

....

... The black American community’s social and political power derives from its inclusiveness. Everyone who identifies as black has traditionally been welcomed, no matter their skin color or date of arrival. In Britain, in contrast, dark-skinned people who trace their relatives to particular former colonies can be cliquish. Beyond the fact that blacks make up a smaller share of the population here, this regional identity may be a reason that the British black community isn’t as powerful a social and political force.

....

Via Matt Nesbit's Framing Science blog, this is an informative Boston Globe article summarizing research on race and gender stereotyping, and assessing implications for the Presidential election.

Along somewhat similar lines, in a number of past elections white candidates running against black candidates have done better on election day than they did in polls. But as this comparison of poll numbers and electoral results from the primaries to date shows, Barack Obama has actually done better in final results than in final polls in a majority of states so far.

In Two Faces of Government Spending, Paul Goren posits that "attitudes toward welfare spending and social spending are distinct phenomena because they are subject to differential degrees of stereotypical thinking in the minds of whites." Using data from the 1992, 1996, and 2000 National Election Studies, Goren finds that "whites’ attitudes toward welfare spending and social spending are structured in two-dimensional terms and that stereotypical beliefs about the work ethic of blacks systematically constrain their welfare attitudes and do not affect attitudes toward other social programs." Here's more from the conclusion section of the paper:

In the United States, a subtle yet unmistakable racial frame of reference permeates public discourse on welfare to a far greater extent than discourse on more popular social programs. When public officials and the news media discuss poverty and the government’s role in combating it, they often utilize racial codes and symbols that can affect how citizens think about the welfare poor (Gilens 1999; Mendelberg 2001). If citizens respond to what they see and hear, then we would expect them to learn to think about welfare in terms of race more so than they would for other types of public aid (Chong 1996, 1993).

My analysis of data from several recent NES surveys supports this perspective on two scores. First, the results of an extensive set of measurement analyses imply that the typical citizen maintains distinct attitudes toward welfare spending and other forms of social spending. Second, stereotypical beliefs about the work ethic of blacks systematically affect welfare opinion and fail to influence non-welfare spending opinion, a conclusion that holds on both statistical and substantive grounds. Insofar as public discourse on poverty implies that government assistance for people on welfare is racially different than assistance for other needy citizens, it appears that citizens have internalized these notions.

.... What is new is the finding that attitudes toward social spending conceived more broadly lay beyond the influence of racial antipathies. Hence, while it is disheartening to know that welfare attitudes are contaminated by racial animosities, it is reassuring to discover that attitudes toward other federal efforts to help the needy lie beyond the baleful influence of racial bigotry.

It would also be interesting to know whether there are similar structured differences in whites' opinions about targeted programs vs. more universal programs, ie, are targeted programs more affected by racially biased attitudes than universal programs. Goren categorizes spending in a way that doesn't necessarily get at this difference:

Welfare spending opinion is gauged using the “welfare programs” and “food stamps” items, which are available in all three studies. Social spending opinion is measured using a series of items that differ somewhat from year to year. The questions ask about spending on “poor people”, “child care”, “Social Security” (available all years), the “homeless” (1992 and 1996), and “government assistance to unemployed” and “aid to the big cities” (1992).

In an attempt, I guess, to argue that Ronald Reagan wasn't engaging in race-baiting when he told stories about "welfare queens" driving Cadillacs or described a "strapping young buck" using food stamps to buy T-bone steaks, conservative Ross Douthat makes the odd choice of updating the welfare queen slur:

If you click through to the story [about the proposed demolition of four public housing complexes in New Orleans], you'll find a photo of Ms. Jasper's digs, paid for out of the public purse, which in addition to having been recently renovated appear to house an absolutely enormous flat screen television. There was, admittedly, no Cadillac in evidence, so calling her a "welfare queen" is a tad unfair. "Welfare duchess," though, seems like a reasonable term of art ...

One would think a smart conservative trying to make the case that "welfare queens" are not mythical, and that people telling stories about them are not engaged in race-baiting, would have the good sense to point to an real-life example that is both clear cut and not a person of color. I thought The Atlantic's Ross Douthat was a relatively smart conservative, but judging from his post, he's not. The evidence he points to of the underlying truthiness of the welfare queen myth, a photo of a "welfare duchess" and her "digs" reveals her to be—surprise!—a black woman. And the article provides no information on Ms. Jasper to support Ms. Douthat's implication that she is a "welfare duchess", whatever that is.

More generally, as the comments on Mr. Douthat's post reveal, pointing to a photo of a black woman who receives a housing subsidy and using a revised form of the welfare queen slur inevitably leads to discourse that is hostile and uncivil, even by blog standards, and full of negative characterizations of working class individuals.

Mr. Douthat should know by now that, in the words of Republican pollster Frank Luntz, "it's not what you say, it's what people hear." And when you say "welfare queen", or "welfare duchess" for that matter, what comes to the minds of many people are nasty stereotypes of people of color.

Research conducted by UCLA's Franklin Gilliam provides further evidence on this point:

... among white subjects, exposure to [the welfare queen narrative] reduced support for various welfare programs, increased stereotyping of African-Americans, and heightened support for maintaining traditional gender roles. ....

Of course, there's always the possibility that Douthat, who may be unfamiliar with the research on stereotyping, may have made an "innocent mistake" of the same kind that conservatives argue Reagan made. If that's the case, he'd be smart to apologize to Ms. Jasper, and, to not, like Reagan, keep making that same mistake over and over again.

In the 1990s, the difference in poverty rates between whites and blacks narrowed. But it would be a mistake to conclude that improvement in narrowing racial disparities went very far beyond that. According to a new analysis from Urban:

Some of the disparities between whites and blacks narrowed between 1997 and 2002, especially among people with low incomes. In particular, gaps between low-income blacks and whites narrowed in educational attainment and earnings. But gaps in income remained essentially unchanged over the entire period. And low-income blacks continued to participate at higher rates than whites in various public assistance and subsidy programs. In conjunction with lower income levels, blacks generally face higher rates of economic hardship than whites, and, for the most part, racial disparities persisted over the 1997 to 2002 period. Disparities between blacks and whites with respect to wealth accumulation also persisted despite the gains in education and earnings.