13

Chapter 13:
The New Racism and American Ethos

Question:

Under what conditions do Americans discriminate against blacks by practicing a racial double standard?

The authors focus is on the "New Racism" theory, which says that conservative hide racism by, attack blacks on American value arguments: values, work ethics etc., when in reality they are just practicing racism.

Definition of Racism

" The willingness to honor a clam to a public benefit in the case of nonblacks but not in that of a black, although the two are otherwise alike."

Measurement: "Laid off Worker" experiment

Ask people about whether a mythical employee should be given government benefits.

A description of the employee is given in each question but factors such as race, gender and family status is swapped at random

Goal was to see if the number of people that would support aid for the worker would change based on the race description (white or black) or party identity of the respondent.

Results (Page 250)

Liberals based on Race
Claimant	Male	Female	Total
White	4.4	6.1	5.3
Black	5.2	5.5	5.4
Total	4.8	5.8	5.3

Conservatives based on Race
Claimant	Male	Female	Total
White	3.7	3.2	3.5
Black	4.9	5.2	5.1
Total	4.3	4.2	4.3

Results (Page 253)

Liberals based on Work
Claimant	Dependable	Undependable	Total
White	5.5	5.1	5.3
Black	5.2	5.6	5.4
Total	5.3	5.4	5.3

Conservatives based on Work
Claimant	Dependable	Undependable	Total
White	3.5	3.4	3.5
Black	6.0	4.0	5.2
Total	4.7	3.7	4.3

Conclusion:

Conservatives gave benefits to blacks more often than whites in all instances except when described as undependable, when they gave them equally.

Authors conclude that when conservatives are given the pretext to display racism as described in the new racism theory they did not.

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