Latino Tú Latino Yo: Group Threat and Group Consciousness in California

Abstract

This paper examines the rise of group consciousness in California during the 1990s. Many scholars have studied the increase in political participation in California and have alluded to an increase in group consciousness, but studies have not captured whether or not this actually exists. In this paper, I use seven surveys conducted between 1989 and 2004 and leverage the timing of these surveys to examine the role of perceived discrimination on Latino group consciousness in California. I hypothesize that the impact of political threat motivated an increase in group consciousness, which is driven by Latinos who perceived the discriminatory nature of California’s proposition politics in the 1990s. I find support for the hypothesis that perceived discrimination is positively associated with group consciousness during this time. However, the relationship between perceived group discrimination and group consciousness weakens after the threatening time period, even though reported levels of group consciousness continued to increase. This finding suggests that group threat may activate group consciousness even after feelings of threat have subsided.