Structural Conduciveness, Structural Strain, and the Occurrence of Race Riots

Abstract

Abstract To ‘explain’ the oCCurrence of race riots in its proper perspective, a theoretical system was needed which was sufficiently abstract to encompass all violent outbursts and yet which allowed for the extraction of relevant independent variables. Smelser's value-added process provided just such a theoretical system. Although it is an attempt to ‘explain’ all collective behavior per se, just his theory of hostile outbursts wa.s used. The foregoing is especially true since a definition of hostile outbursts in general is a definition of race riots in particular. From Smelser's theory, structural conduciveness and structural strain emerged as the major independent variables which ‘explain’ the occurrence of race riots. To test the hypothesis, structural conduciveness was operationalized as ‘national political campaign atmosphere’ while structural strain was operationalized as ‘the Negro issue in party platforms.’ In employing a modified version of content analysis to peruse the New York Times Index's co...