Abstract
The "symbolic racism" thesis now prominent in discussions of American politics holds that racism is expressed through a combination of negative racial affect and traditional values. This note provides a comparative perspective on these debates by investigating the nature of German anti-Semitism through a Linear Structural Relations (LISREL) analysis of recent survey data. This reveals that among Germans a base anti-Semitic affect is separate from both conservative values and public perception of Jews' work ethics and morality. The structural equation portion of the LISREL model indicates that negative racial affect greatly outweighs the other factors in explaining Germans' willingness to assume responsibility for "the Jewish Question," suggesting that the German public bases its attitudes toward Jews on the crudest and most enduring stereotypes and feels little need to express its reservations in symbolic terms.
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