Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-7cvxr Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-27T08:52:13.243Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

INVESTMENT AND INVISIBILITY

The Racially Divergent Consequences of Political Trust

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 February 2020

Aaron Rosenthal
Aaron Rosenthal*
Affiliation:
Department of Political Science and International Relations, Simmons University
*
*Corresponding author: Professor Aaron Rosenthal, Department of Political Science and International Relations, Simmons University, 300 The Fenway, Boston, MA 02115. Email: aaron.rosenthal@simmons.edu.
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Does political distrust generate a desire to engage in the political process or does it foster demobilization? Utilizing a theoretical framework rooted in government experiences and a mixed-methods research design, this article highlights the racially contingent meaning of political distrust to show that both relationships exist. For Whites, distrust is tied to a perception of tax dollars being poorly spent, leading to increased political involvement as Whites to try to gain control over “their” investment in government. For People of Color, distrust of government is grounded in a fear of the criminal justice system, and thus drives disengagement by motivating a desire for invisibility in relation to the state. Ultimately, this finding highlights a previously unseen racial heterogeneity in the political consequences of distrust. Further, it demonstrates how the state perpetuates racially patterned political inequality in a time when many of the formal laws engendering this dynamic have fallen away.

Keywords

Political TrustPolitical ParticipationRace and EthnicityPolicy FeedbackPolitical InequalityCriminal Justice SystemTaxationRacial Inequality
Type
State of the Art
Information
Du Bois Review: Social Science Research on Race , Volume 16 , Issue 2 , Fall 2019 , pp. 511 - 533
Copyright
Copyright © Hutchins Center for African and African American Research 2020 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Alexander, Michelle (2010). The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness. New York: The New Press.Google Scholar
Almond, Gabriel, and Verba, Sidney (1963). The Civic Culture: Political Attitudes and Democracy in Five Countries. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Baumgartner, Frank R., Epp, Derek A., Shoub, Kelsey, and Love, Bayard (2017). Targeting Young Men of Color for Search and Arrest during Traffic Stops: Evidence from North Carolina, 2002–2013. Politics, Groups, and Identities, 5(1): 107–131.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brayne, Sarah (2014). Surveillance and System Avoidance: Criminal Justice Contact and Institutional Attachment. American Sociological Review, 79(3): 367–391.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Campbell, Andrea Louise (2003). How Policies Make Citizens: Senior Political Activism and the American Welfare State. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chan, Sophia (1997). Effects of Attention to Campaign Coverage on Political Trust. International Journal of Public Opinion Research, 9(3): 286–296.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Citrin, Jack (1974). Comment: The Political Relevance of Trust in Government. American Political Science Review, 68(3): 973–988.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Citrin, Jack (1977). Political Alienation as a Social Indicator: Attitudes and Action. Social Indicators Research, 4(4): 381–419.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cohen, Cathy (2010). Democracy Remixed: Black Youth and the Future of American Politics. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Du Bois, W. E. B. (1899). The Philadelphia Negro: A Social Study. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press.Google Scholar
Edelman, Murray (1985). The Symbolic Uses of Politics. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press.Google Scholar
Epp, Charles R., Maynard-Moody, Steven, and Haider-Markel, Donald P. (2014). Pulled Over: How Police Stops Define Race and Citizenship. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gamson, William A. (1968). Power and Discontent. Homewood, IL: Dorsey Press.Google Scholar
Goffman, Alice (2014). On the Run: Fugitive Life in an American City. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Griffin, John D., and Keane, Michael (2006). Descriptive Representation and the Composition of African American Turnout. American Journal of Political Science, 50(4): 998–1012.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hackett, Ursula (2017). Theorizing the Submerged State: The Politics of Private Schools in the United States. Policy Studies Journal, 45(3): 464–489.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hackett, Ursula (2019). Attenuated Governance: How Policymakers Insulate Private School Choice from Legal Challenge. Policy Studies Journal, 47(2): 237–273.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hetherington, Marc J. (2005). Why Trust Matters: Declining Political Trust and the Demise of American Liberalism. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Hooghe, Marc, and Marien, Sofie (2013). A Comparative Analysis of the Relation between Political Trust and Forms of Political Participation in Europe. European Societies, 15(1): 131–152.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jackson, John S. (1973). Alienation and Black Political Participation. The Journal of Politics, 35(4): 849–885.10.2307/2129212CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Katzenstein, Mary Fainsod, and Waller, Maureen R. (2015). Taxing the Poor: Incarceration, Poverty Governance, and the Seizure of Family Resources. Perspectives on Politics, 13(3): 638–656.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
King, Desmond S. (2017). Forceful Federalism against American Racial Inequality. Government and Opposition, 52(2): 356–382.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
King, Desmond S., and Lieberman, Robert C. (2008). Finding the American State: Transcending the ‘Statelessness’ Account. Polity, 40(3): 368–378.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
King, Desmond S., and Lieberman, Robert C. (2009). Ironies of State Building: A Comparative Perspective on the American State. World Politics, 61(3): 547–588.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
King, Desmond S., and Smith, Rogers M. (2005). Racial Orders in American Political Development. American Political Science Review, 99(1): 75–92.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lerman, Amy E., and Weaver, Vesla (2014a). Staying out of Sight?: Concentrated Policing and Local Political Action. The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 651(1): 202–219.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lerman, Amy E., and Weaver, Vesla (2014b). Arresting Citizenship: The Democratic Consequences of American Crime Control. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Levi, Margaret, and Stoker, Laura (2000). Political Trust and Trustworthiness. Annual Review of Political Science, 3(1): 475–507.10.1146/annurev.polisci.3.1.475CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lin, Ann Chih (1998). Bridging Positivist and Interpretivist Approaches to Qualitative Methods. Policy Studies Journal, 26(1): 162–180.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lo Wang, Hansi (2016). Distrust of Government Drove Many New Hampshire Voters to Trump. National Public Radio, November 14. <https://www.wnyc.org/story/distrust-of-government-drove-many-new-hampshire-voters-to-trump/> (accessed October 1, 2018).Google Scholar
Martin, Isaac William (2008). The Permanent Tax Revolt: How the Property Tax Transformed American Politics. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar
McGregor, Alecia J., Bogart, Laura M., Higgins-Biddle, Molly, Strolovitch, Dara Z., and Ojikutu, Bisola (2019). Marginalized Yet Mobilized: Race, Sexuality, and the Role of ‘Political Hypervigilance’ in African American Political Participation in 2016. Du Bois Review: Social Science Research on Race. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S1742058X19000031CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mettler, Suzanne (2002). Bringing the State Back In to Civic Engagement: Policy Feedback Effects of the G.I. Bill for World War II Veterans. American Political Science Review, 92(2): 351–365.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mettler, Suzanne (2011). The Submerged State: How Invisible Government Policies Undermine American Democracy. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Michener, Jamila (2019). Policy Feedback in a Racialized Polity. Policy Studies Journal, 47(2): 423–450.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Miller, Arthur H. (1974). Rejoinder to “Comment” by Jack Citrin: Political Discontent or Ritualism? American Political Science Review, 68(3): 989–1001.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Miller, Warren E. (1980). Disinterest, Disaffection, and Participation in Presidential Politics. Political Behavior, 2(1): 7–32.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Morgan, Kimberly J. (2007). Constricting the Welfare State: Tax Policy and the Political Movement Against Government. In Soss, Joe, Hacker, Jacob S., and Mettler, Suzanne (Eds.), Remaking America: Democracy and Public Policy in and Age of Inequality, pp. 27–50. New York: Russell Sage Foundation.Google Scholar
Morgan, Kimberly J., and Campbell, Andrea Louise (2011). The Delegated Welfare State: Medicare, Markets, and the Governance of Social Policy. New York: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Muhammad, Khalil Gibran (2010). The Condemnation of Blackness: Race, Crime, and the Making of Modern Urban America. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nichols, Vanessa Cruz, LeBrón, Alana M. W., and Pedraza, Francisco I. (2018). Policing Us Sick: The Health of Latinos in an Era of Heightened Deportations and Racialized Policing. PS: Political Science & Politics, 51(2): 293–297.Google Scholar
Nie, Norman H., and Verba, Sidney (1987). Participation in America: Political Democracy and Social Equality. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Nunnally, Shayla C. (2012). Trust in Black America: Race, Discrimination, and Politics. New York: NYU Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Omi, Michael, and Howard, Winant (2014). Racial Formation in the United States. New York: Routledge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Orren, Gary (1997). Fall from Grace: The Public’s Loss of Faith in Government. In Nye, Joseph S., Zelikow, Philip D., and King, David C. (Eds.), Why People Don’t Trust Government, pp. 77–108. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Owens, Michael Leo, and Walker, Hannah L. (2018). The Civic Voluntarism of ‘Custodial Citizens’: Involuntary Criminal Justice Contact, Associational Life, and Political Participation. Perspectives on Politics, 16(4): 990–1013.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pew Research Center (2015). Beyond Distrust: How Americans View Their Government. Washington, D.C.Google Scholar
Phillips, Christian (2018). Wanting, and Weighting: White Women and Descriptive Representation in the 2016 Presidential Election. Journal of Race, Ethnicity and Politics, 3(1): 29–51.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pierson, Paul (1993). When Effect Becomes Cause: Policy Feedback and Political Change. World Politics, 45(4): 595–628.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Putnam, Robert D. (2001). Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community. New York: Simon & Schuster.Google Scholar
Roediger, David R. (2007). The Wages of Whiteness: Race and the Making of the American Working Class. London: Verso.Google Scholar
Rosenstone, Steven J., and Hansen, John Mark (1993). Mobilization, Participation, and Democracy in America. New York: Macmillan Publishing Company.Google Scholar
Roth, Zachary (2014). Ferguson’s Lack of Diversity Goes Way Beyond Its Cops. MSNBC.Com, August 4. <http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/ferguson-lack-diversity-goes-way-beyond-its-cops> (accessed October 1, 2018).Google Scholar
Rubin, Herbert J., and Rubin, Irene S. (2011). Qualitative Interviewing: The Art of Hearing Data. Third Edition. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications, Inc.Google Scholar
Schaffer, Frederic Charles (2016). Elucidating Social Science Concepts: An Interpretivist Guide. New York,: Routledge.Google Scholar
Sentencing Project, The (2016). Fact Sheet: Trends in U.S. Corrections. <https://www.gnjumc.org/content/uploads/2016/03/Trends-in-Corrections-Fact-sheet.pdf> (accessed November 19, 2019).+(accessed+November+19,+2019).>Google Scholar
Shingles, Richard D. (1981). Black Consciousness and Political Participation: The Missing Link. The American Political Science Review, 75(1): 76–91.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Soss, Joe (2000). Unwanted Claims: The Politics of Participation in the U.S. Welfare System. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Soss, Joe (2014). Talking Our Way to Meaningful Explanations: A Practice-Centered View of Interviewing for Interpretive Research. In Yanow, Dvora and Schwartz-Shea, Peregrine (Eds.) Interpretation and Method: Empirical Research Methods and the Interpretive Turn, Second Edition, pp. 161–182. Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe.Google Scholar
Soss, Joe, and Weaver, Vesla (2017). Police Are Our Government: Politics, Political Science, and the Policing of Race-Class Subjugated Communities. Annual Review of Political Science, 20: 565–591.10.1146/annurev-polisci-060415-093825CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stout, Christopher T. (2018). Obamacares: Candidate Traits, Descriptive Representation, and Black Political Participation. Journal of Race, Ethnicity and Politics, 3(2): 356–380.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tate, Katherine (2004). Black Faces in the Mirror: African Americans and Their Representatives in the U.S. Congress. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Thurston, Chloe N. (2018). Black Lives Matter, American Political Development, and the Politics of Visibility. Politics, Groups, and Identities, 6(1): 162–170.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
U.S Department of Justice(DOJ) (2015). Investigation of the Ferguson Police Department. United State Department of Justice Civil Rights Division.Google Scholar
Verba, Sidney, Lehman Schlozman, Kay, and Henry, Brady (1995). Voice and Equality: Civic Voluntarism in American Politics. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Von Drehle, David (2017). What the Vietnam War Tells Us about Trump Voters. Washington Post, September 19. <www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/what-the-vietnam-war-tells-us-about-trump-voters/2017/09/19/01c7e422-9d59-11e7-9c8d-cf053ff30921_story.html> (accessed October 1, 2018).Google Scholar
Walker, Hannah L., and García-Castañon, Marcela (2017). For Love and Justice: The Mobilizing of Race, Gender, and Criminal Justice Contact. Politics & Gender, 13(4): 541–568.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wallace, Gregory (2016). Voter Turnout at 20-Year Low in 2016. CNN Politics, November 30. <http://www.cnn.com/2016/11/11/politics/popular-vote-turnout-2016/index.html> (accessed October 1, 2018).Google Scholar
Walsh, Camille (2017). White Backlash, the ‘Taxpaying’ Public, and Educational Citizenship. Critical Sociology, 43 (2): 237–247.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weissmann, Jordan (2014). Ferguson Is Mostly Black. Why Is Its Government So White? Slate, August 14. <www.slate.com/business/2014/08/ferguson-missouri-government-why-is-it-so-white.html> (accessed October 1, 2018)Google Scholar
Winant, Howard (1993). Amazing Race: Recent Writing on Racial Politics and Theory. Socialist Review, 23(2): 160–183.Google Scholar
Young, Richard, and Meisner, Jeffrey (2008). Race and the Dual State in the Early American Republic. In Joseph, Lowndes, Novkov, Julie, and Warren, Dorian (Eds). Race and American Political Development, pp. 31–58. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Supplementary material: File

Rosenthal Supplementary Materials

Rosenthal Supplementary Materials

Download Rosenthal Supplementary Materials(File)
File 83.2 KB