Review: Racial Stasis: The Millennial Generation and the Stagnation of Racial Attitudes in American Politics, by Christopher D. DeSante and Candis Watts Smith

Abstract

Scholars investigating racial attitudes have spent forty years trying to understand the nature, structure, and potency of racial resentment in American politics, especially among white Americans. Central to the debate has been whether racial attitudes, when measured as racial resentment, capture ideological orientations or racial prejudice. This carefully constructed, well-organized book—Racial Stasis: The Millennial Generation and the Stagnation of Racial Attitudes in American Politics by Christopher D. DeSante and Candis Watts Smith—takes up the charge from scholars of Black politics who have called for better measurements of racial attitudes. Relying on quantitative and qualitative data, DeSante and Watts Smith make a significant contribution to the academic literature by engaging in one of the first systematic studies of racial attitudes among white millennials while controlling for cohort and period effects. These scholars present new measures of racial attitudes called FIRE (fear, institutionalized racism, and empathy), which refer to whites’ fear of other racial groups, an acknowledgment of institutional racism, awareness of white privilege, and empathy. Through a series of empirical analyses and qualitative interviews, the authors uncover that the racial language that white millennials use to talk about race has changed. Thus, the forty-year-old measures introduced by Kinder and Sears (1981) might not be fully capturing white millennials’ attitudes about race.It has widely been assumed that because millennials are the most progressive group of voters in the electorate, they will push the country in a more progressive direction on racial issues; however, DeSante and Watts Smith find that this is not at all the case. Using theoretically sound arguments and sophisticated methodologies, the authors compellingly argue that “younger Whites, namely members of the millennial generation, are not doing the work that young people in the past have done to make significant and positive changes in aggregate racial attitudes or in policies that aim to ameliorate racial disparities” (4). While DeSante and Watts Smith make a significant contribution to the literature both theoretically and empirically, the claim that younger generations of whites are not doing the work that the prior generation did is interesting primarily because white millennials' attitudes are only slightly more progressive than the prior generation's. Although attitudes of the older generation of whites have certainly shifted from biological racism to new racism, the older generation of whites’ opposition to policies designed to bring about systematic change is also found among white millennials, as DeSante and Watts Smith show (see findings on white millennials’ attitude toward affirmative action). Still, this work will contribute significantly to scholars interested in understanding the changing nature of racial attitudes, debates about how to measure these attitudes, and the role of ideology as a two-dimensional factor in shaping racial attitudes. This book is timely, engaging, easy to read, methodologically sophisticated, and relevant to discussions about race in America at a time when scholars have observed a shift in the norms of racial rhetoric.In chapters 1 and 2, the authors present the racial stasis hypothesis and investigate whether race occupies a special place in the political considerations of white millennials and older whites. The evidence presented in this chapter shows that across twenty different survey items, ranging from affirmative action for women to support of LBGTQ issues, white American attitudes have improved substantially. The evidence on questions of affirmative action for Blacks, the government ensuring fair employment practices for Blacks, government help for Blacks, welfare spending, and the feeling thermometer that gauges differences between White-Black attitudes, however, have flatlined, suggesting that while whites have become more progressive on a host of other issues, their support for policies aimed at helping Black Americans has not. Scholars have used multiple frameworks to explain white opposition to racialized policies, such as color-blind logic and principled politics, and while these explanations dress up whites’ opposition in colorful language, the findings that explain racial stasis might be a function of deeply embedded anti-Black racism that is being passed from one generation to the next. The authors assert that white millennials are not doing the work that the prior generation did; however, it is also plausible that white millennials are doing precisely what the generation did before them—that is, doing very little to dismantle systems of racial inequality. This is not to say that older generations of whites’ racial attitudes have not changed (from old-fashioned racism to racial resentment). While there is evidence to suggest that they have changed, there is also evidence that suggests that some forms of racial prejudice still predict white attitudes. If the older generation of whites “did the work,” then there should be the expectation that older whites’ positions on race should certainly be more liberal. This is not the case, as the authors find that “the oldest Whites, controlling for period and cohort, are about twice as likely to express beliefs in old-fashioned racism as younger Whites” (52).Building on the findings of the previous chapters, the authors assert that to suggest white millennials are more racially tolerant than the older generation of whites is a profound “misunderstanding of race and racism in the United States” (39–40). In chapter 3, DeSante and Watts Smith argue that Kinder and Sear’s (1981) measures of racial resentment are outdated and may fail to capture racial attitudes among white millennials accurately. The authors’ significant finding in this chapter is that although white millennials are less racially resentful than their parents, the indicator may be because young people tend to be liberal. Two key pieces of evidence presented in this chapter support the authors’ assertion that racial attitudes among millennials are changing––white millennials’ support for Black Lives Matter and their response to the question about aid to Blacks. According to DeSante and Watts Smith, “despite the most racially liberal millennials having a higher level of support for aid to Blacks, the most racially resentful millennials are statistically indistinguishable from older respondents who score just as high on the scale” (930). Even more surprising is the fact that “with regard to Black Lives Matter, White millennials are not warmer toward the group than older Whites” (93). To explain these findings, DeSante and Watts Smith cite Blinder’s (2007) two-track socialization. In trying to make sense of why younger whites may support symbols that are antiracist but reject policies that dismantle such systems, the authors suggest that the political science measures used to tap into racial attitudes are failing to capture the complexities of modern racial attitudes among white millennials.In chapter 4, DeSante and Watts Smith test the racial stasis hypothesis by interviewing white millennials. In the interviews, the authors are able to unpack and discover the manner in which white millennials understand race. The evidence suggests that white millennials do not use older forms of “racial animus,” nor do they have “persistent racial disparities” (102). According to Racial Stasis, white millennials rely on two previous unused explanations in political science: color-blind ideology and diversity logic. These factors allow millennials to “appear more progressive” because they claim that they do not see race while at the same time claiming that they appreciate diversity. This theoretical explanation is powerful because it helps us to understand how young whites navigate racial spaces. This particular understanding also allows us to make sense of how whites who claim to be allies have no real commitment to diversity issues. Another substantial claim presented in this chapter is that younger generations of whites are impacted by what the authors call countervailing forces that mitigate the racial views of younger whites––the moving door of racism, the diversity dilemma, white privilege, and paradox of generations. The rest of the chapter presents the findings from the interviews which demonstrate that white millennials seem to fundamentally misunderstand race and racism in America by defining racism as overt acts, seeing race as a Black and White issue, thinking that racism only happens in the South, and conflating race with class. The findings from the interviews are jarring, but they are not surprising. Even though the theory of countervailing forces is applied to younger whites, there are questions about whether this explanation can apply to older generations or even minority populations. Hanes Walton has consistently challenged scholars of Black politics to think about the political context, and this particular theoretical model does just that.In the same way that these countervailing forces counter white progressive attitudes on race, one must wonder if racially conscious countervailing forces impact racial identity, particularly among racial and ethnic minorities. Chapter 5 examines how younger whites responded to racialized public policies. In interviews, DeSante and Watts Smith asked younger whites about stop-and-frisk and affirmative action policies. The result indicates that “while our millennials respondents were highly opposed to a policy that is racially discriminatory, they were also largely opposed to a policy or set of policies that aim to close gaps between racial groups” (156). The authors uncover that empathy also influenced younger whites’ policy preferences as well.In chapter 6, the authors explain that because younger whites rely on color-blind ideology to discuss race and are socialized in a society that does not encourage conversations about race, scholars interested in this subject need to develop questions on racial attitudes that tap into these two factors. Testing the Color Blind Racial Attitudes Scale, the findings show that “White millennials are no more likely than their older counterparts to acknowledge that being White is associated with receiving advantages, and they are just as likely to believe that race is not an important factor in shaping certain kinds of opportunities for minorities” (187). In chapter 7, the authors test new measures of racial attitudes and find overall that “millennial Whites are likely to acknowledge their racial privilege, but they are no more likely to be saddened or angered by racial injustice” (223). Additionally, the authors’ major contribution is showing that whites’ racial attitudes are linked to two dimensions: cognitive thinking and empathy. After confirming the model’s validity, the authors present the FIRE battery and test the explanatory power of the FIRE model in chapter 8. The model performs well and is predictive of white millennials’ attitude toward interracial marriage. So far, the results have painted a bleak picture of the future of racial attitudes in America; however, on a positive note, the authors find that millennials are more likely to express being angry about racism and acknowledge their privilege, and they do have more progressive attitudes when compared to the prior generation. However, this finding is also accompanied by a reality that younger whites do not believe that whites have advantages because of their race (244).Overall, Racial Stasis provides scholars interested in this subject with a new way to investigate and study racial attitudes. The book has major implications for the academic literature, institutional diversity, and large datasets such as the American National Election Survey and the General Social Science Survey. It is bound to generate discussions and debates about racial attitudes, how to measure these attitudes, and the degree to which these new measures are predictive of political behavior. Finally, this work is also likely to generate theoretical debates. The academic literature suggests that Kinder and Sear’s (1981) measures of racial attitudes are not a function of biological racism but instead are predicated on the idea that Blacks violate fundamental American values. Although scholars have relied up on Kinder and Sear’s (1981) measures of racial attitudes for a very long time, scholars must develop/theorize new ways to measure anti-Black racism in a society where the norms of racial rhetoric have shifted dramatically. Society is rampant with anti-Blackness in the media, criminal justice system, and so many other institutions. Likely, what we see happening with younger whites is simply a new manifestation of racism that allows younger whites to have these seemingly contradictory views on racial equity, especially with regard to Black people. Finally, Racial Stasis: The Millennial Generation and the Stagnation of Racial Attitudes in American Politics is indeed a work that is already shaping how scholars investigate and understand racial attitudes in America.