In the years that followed the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests, the US federal government, cities, and states enacted sweeping reforms of the police and criminal justice system. To counter the narrative of racialized police violence and promote community policing, these included new hate crime statutes and dedicated bias-crime task forces. This article reviews the literature on the enforcement of hate crime, evaluates post-2020 antibias initiatives, and advises realistic expectations about the long-term impact of reform efforts. For starters, hate crimes are massively underreported. Even when reported, police often fail to accurately identify and charge a hate crime. Police officers exercise wide discretion, often accord hate crimes low priority, struggle to prove the bias motive of the offender, and come under political pressure to drop bias-motivated charges. Even when charged, few defendants are convicted of a hate crime because prosecutors frequently dismiss the hate crime charge. Prosecutors are expected to resolve cases quickly and may use a hate crime charge as leverage in plea bargaining. Media coverage, political pressure, and the involvement of victims and civil rights groups predict prosecutorial pursuit of a hate crime conviction. Hate crime policing and prosecutions may be enhanced by specialized hate crime units in police departments and prosecutors’ offices; clear policies that define terms and investigatory procedures; and enhanced communication between police, prosecutors, and target communities.

Some incidents of male violence against women and girls (MVAWG) could be recognized as sex-motivated hate crimes. Often, however, crimes of male violence are neither treated as hate crimes nor reported as sex-motivated. This article examines sex-motivated hate, and the violence that results from sex-motivated hate in Canada, to explore its absolute and relative visibility. Sex is included as a targeted social group in hate crime laws in Canada. We consider whether and how sex is reflected in crime reporting data, sentencing, and public discourse. We demonstrate that violence motivated by sex is rarely identified as hate crime by legal actors tasked with enforcing and implementing criminal offence and sentencing provisions. We conclude by providing steps that could be taken to ensure sex-motivated hate, including sex-motivated violence, is recognized as a form of hate like other more commonly recognized targeted groups going forward.

This study investigates the definition of hate crime and the experiences of Chinese residents in Edinburgh who have faced such incidents post-COVID-19, giving voice to this marginalised group's ‘invisible scars’. It explores the underlying dynamics of hate crimes, emphasising the process of ‘othering’ or ‘differentiation’ based on victim vulnerabilities, often intertwined with offenders’ feelings of anxiety and fear about their life conditions. Specifically, the research reveals the tendency of Chinese individuals to underreport hate crimes, especially microaggressions – victims’ possibility of reporting is highly linked with the perceived personal impact of the offence. Furthermore, the study examines the reasons behind this reluctance to report, such as the perceived imbalance between the costs and benefits of reporting, a normalisation process, lack of familiarity with hate crime laws and legal procedures, and negative perceptions of the police.

This article draws on a qualitative study that examines how Asian-descendant victims of hate activities in Canada perceive, interpret, and engage with hate crime laws and the legal system. My findings show that participants’ understanding of these laws is deeply relational, shaped by their encounters with perpetrators, the legal system, and the nation-state. While participants acknowledge the symbolic promise of protection and justice that hate crime laws offer, they also perceive these laws as potential sources of burdens and harm. This ambivalence stems from personal experiences and broader social and institutional contexts that influence how marginalized individuals perceive legal protections and justice. By examining these dynamics, this study advances law and society scholarship by offering a nuanced understanding of how marginalized communities navigate and interpret legal protections, emphasizing the need to critically assess legal processes through the lived experiences of underrepresented individuals.

Bias-based bullying (i.e., bullying targeting actual or perceived aspects of one's identity) is a form of interpersonal victimization that has adverse consequences for youth functioning. While research has documented foundational knowledge on bias-based bullying, few studies have incorporated a multilevel longitudinal approach to examining theorized risk and protective factors of this complex phenomenon. The current study addresses this gap by investigating predictors (e.g., school climate and state laws) at multiple social-ecological levels and comparing the magnitude of coefficients. Three data sources were used: (a) data from a sample of adolescents (N = 639) participating in a four-wave longitudinal study regarding their experiences with bias-based bullying, (b) external data on enumerated anti-bullying laws, and (c) external data on protected categories in state hate crime statutes. We estimated a series of latent growth curve models to examine trajectories of bias-based bullying victimization over the 18-month study period and added social-ecological predictors (sociodemographic characteristics, peer support, family support, school climate, enumerated anti-bullying laws, and an index of protected categories in state hate crime laws) of bias-based bullying victimization. Key findings documented that sexual minority youth and youth identifying as another racial identity, non-Hispanic had higher initial bias-based bullying victimization scores, with sexual minority youth decreasing at a significantly more rapid rate than heterosexual youth. Peer support, family support, school climate, and enumerated anti-bullying laws were significantly associated with the intercept factor (i.e., initial status) of bias-based bullying victimization. Notably, school climate emerged as an important protective factor in the fully adjusted model, predicting initial bias-based bullying victimization scores. This study provides new information on risk and protective factors and is critical for tailoring prevention and intervention efforts to mitigate this form of victimization. Bolstering support for vulnerable youth and promoting a positive school climate are recommended.

Abstract State‐level hate crime laws are a proposed solution for pernicious effects endured by transgender and gender diverse (e.g., no‐binary, queer) (TGD) communities. The present study investigated the following correlates of psychological distress, suicidal behavior, and discrimination experiences among TGD adults: State‐level hate crime law statutes (e.g., gender identity protection), state‐level attitudes (e.g., conservative ideology), and individual‐level marginalized identities (e.g., sexual minority status). Participants were all TGD adults in the 2015 United States Transgender Survey (USTS). We merged three data sources: the USTS, Cooperative Congressional Election Study, and the Anti‐Defamation League's Hate Crime Map. We employed bivariate and logistic regression analyses. Prominent findings spanning the whole sample included: (a) worse psychological distress was associated with living in a state with greater anti‐TGD attitudes and an absence of gender identity protections; (b) worse 12‐month suicidal behavior was associated with living in a state with an absence of gender identity and police data collection statutes; and (c) holding multiple marginalized identities, particularly having a disability, was the strongest risk factor for experiencing negative outcomes. Findings are contextualized by debates about hate crime laws. We offer recommendations for mental health promotion and suicide prevention, hate crimes training, and future research.

IntroductionEmerging transgender and gender diverse (TGD) health models focus on social well-being. The present study contributes to this movement through investigation of hate crime statutes, state-level political and anti-TGD attitudes, and multiple marginalized identities as correlates of social well-being (i.e., outness, community connection, and workplace and familial support).MethodsThe current study merged data from three sources: (a) the 2015 United States Transgender Survey (USTS), (b) the 2014 and 2018 Cooperative Congressional Election Studies (CCES), and (c) the 2018 Anti-Defamation League’s (ADL) Hate Crime Map. Bivariate (e.g., chi-square) and regression analyses were used to identify correlates of social well-being among TGD adults in the USA.ResultsAll types of hate crime laws showed bivariate protective associations for outness and family support. Regression models showed that several marginalized identities (e.g., having a disability) were the most consistent and largest correlates of social well-being. Higher state-level anti-TGD attitudes were linked with lower familial support and outness. The presence of state-level hate crime law civil action and police training statutes was positively associated with outness.ConclusionsThe results extend the limited research on correlates of TGD social well-being. Findings support TGD health models addressing resilience and social safety. Future research should address hate crime law policy analysis, police training evaluation, and prospective testing of TGD social well-being.Policy ImplicationsHate crime laws, in particular civil action and police training statutes, may be associated with better outcomes for transgender and gender diverse (TGD) persons. Evaluation of hate crime law effectiveness may need to focus on implementation as opposed to mere presence of laws. Policies specific to police training should include guidelines for training content and rigorous evaluation.

While first implemented in the 1980s, hate crime legislation remains divisive in America; yet, most research examining differences in support for hate crime laws was conducted decades ago. This research addresses this gap by examining individual differences in support for hate crime laws using information from 3,503 survey respondents across the U.S. The results indicate that most respondents (66%) support hate crime laws, and that only roughly 12% of respondents actively oppose them; 22% had no opinion. Results further suggest there are significant gender differences in support; however, these differences are no longer significant after controlling for differences in individual attitudes, including prejudice and Right-Wing Authoritarianism (RWA), which are strong predictors of opinions toward hate crime laws.

This article responds to scholarly critiques, which highlight the failures of hate crime legislation in delivering justice to historically oppressed groups. Drawing on ethnographic data on the mobilisation of India's only hate crime law – the Prevention of Atrocities (PoA) Act– among Dalit (untouchable) communities, the article proposes that the potential of hate crime law to create a restitution must be analysed in conversation with other social justice frameworks. In India, Dalit legal aid advocates interweave hate crime cases with a culturally specific discourse of Dalit human rights. By strategically bringing “failed” PoA investigations before India's National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), Dalit advocates hold the police accountable for negligent investigations, while also creating collective affects of hope for survivors of casteist crimes. This process, which I call symbiotic justice, engenders a form of legal consciousness, which regards hate crime law as a creative tool that can offer new avenues of agency.

Abstract This article brings together theories of truth in legal anthropology and the anthropology of religion to highlight how legal institutions can co‐opt hate crime laws and reproduce patterns of sociopolitical oppression. Drawing on extensive ethnographic research on the social life of India's only hate crime law – the 1989 Prevention of Atrocities Act (PoA), which punishes violence against Dalit (ex‐untouchable) communities – the article argues that hate crime cases involve a clash between three different truth logics: attributive truth or credibility; formal juridical truth regimes defined by evidentiary technicalities; and a distinct mode of experiential‐discriminatory truth, which is defined by its processual character. As Indian police and judiciary conflate these truth logics in practice, they publicly and legally erase realities of caste discrimination and (re)construct marginalized communities like Dalits as greedy and unreliable narrators.

Abstract Why are hate crime cases so rarely prosecuted? Most states and the federal government have hate crime laws on their books, yet available data indicate few prosecutions in most jurisdictions. Drawing on case files and interviews with police and prosecutors in one jurisdiction, three institutional impediments to hate crime prosecution are identified: evidentiary inflation, by which law enforcement uses a higher burden of proof than what is required by statute; loose coupling between police departments and prosecutors' offices; and cultural distance between law enforcement and victims. Findings also reveal that advocacy groups and media can successfully increase the visibility of cases and draw the attention of prosecutors. The findings align with aspects of legal endogeneity theory and enhance our understanding of the role of organizations in constructing the meaning of law. The results also help explain why some laws are rarely enforced, even when they have support from key personnel in an organization.

This article investigates how police officers and prosecutors make sense of and speak about their work with hate crimes. Our analysis rests upon Robert Reiner's widely acknowledged claim that policing is inherently political. We identified three core issues that illustrate the political nature of policing hate crimes. First, the politically contingent boundary work of distinguishing criminal from legal acts. Second, the impact of the enforcement of hate crime laws on the reproduction of social inequalities. Third, the “diversity politics” of gaining legitimacy and trust among minorities, which hate crime legislation is meant to protect. While a strong commitment to policing hate crimes is evident among our interviewees, we ask if the politically invested discourse they present may contribute to an absence of critical reflections regarding the limited effect of law enforcement, as well as a lack of engagement with pressing concerns regarding racialized crime control and racism.

The association between hate crime laws that enumerate sexual orientation and adolescent suicide attempts.

Politics or prejudice? Separating the influence of political affiliation and prejudicial attitudes in determining support for hate crime law.

This article's overall research objective will be to critically analyze the foundational theory of hate crimes. The research question asks to what extent hate crimes are grounded in a foundational commonplace style of elaboration of statutory rules, as propounded by Nicolaus the Sophist, on the bases of the so-called ‘final headings’. The argument seeks to sustain the view that the so-called hate crimes are cognate to final headings elaborations in order to ground commonplace judicial denunciation. The research paradigm identifies underlying norms; therefore, the research methodology is doctrinal, establishing a legal narrative analysis.In extended synthesis, a statute might not proscribe fighting words of racial animus any more than those of hatred of the victim’s family. Regulation of the words’ subject inferred elaboration by the heading of the just and the appropriate. The enigma of the ‘something more’ criterion is ostensibly an elaboration of the possible and the beneficial. Hate crime laws apply to conduct motivated by hate, instead of hate speech. Hate suggests a consequential vitiation of reputation, so that hate crime laws are impliedly elaborated based on the final heading of the appropriate. Online symbolic rhetoric is arguably the enigmatic ‘something more’ and elaborated by the final headings of the possible and the beneficial. Hate crime laws require extraordinary police inquiries into offenders' motives. This conflation of duty and avoiding turning a blind eye implies final headings elaboration by the appropriate and the just. A measurement of victim vulnerability by association with a suffering group is the primary indicium of commonplace, elaborated by the final heading of the beneficial. The key to a hate crimes prosecution for social media actions would be hostility as a vicious error, as already elaborated as being equivalent to hatred, susceptible to elaboration by the final heading of appropriateness.

This article will explore what hate crimes are, and explore why they have been on the rise in recent years. I will track the evolution of hate crime legislation on both a federal and state level and argue that while rises in hate are consistent throughout time, they are also episodic. I will justify the need for hate crime legislation and demonstrate how state hate crime laws vastly differ, using a case study as support. I will make policy suggestions to improve existing legislation and advocate for an increase in federal funding allocated to hate crime training for law enforcement agencies. Lastly, I will suggest that training should also be required in schools and workplaces in order to diminish ignorance and intolerance, and to encourage communities to embrace and celebrate diversity rather than fear it

This article is about denouncing the dehumanisation process that took place in the time of Covid-19. It recognises that governments have a vital role to play in setting national directions to tackle racist violence and that the value of having hate crime laws should not be underestimated. However, it argues that a broader approach is needed to embark upon a re-humanisation initiative and effectively combat racist violence. It emphasises that, to get people truly devoted to a course of action, they must develop a greater understanding of the sources of the problem. Accordingly, this article suggests that academia has a key role to play in shedding light on the occurrence of de-humanisation and the potential for re-humanisation.

Regardless of place and time, hatred exists in society. It is easy to find clear examples of act that would be labeled hate or hate crime today. However, it is not simple a crime in which the offender hate s the victim. In fact, most crimes involving hatred crime between th e parties would not fall under the legal definition of hate crime. It is need that hate crime is more considered as serious crime rat her than general crimes because the victim of the hate crime is not only to individuals but also to groups and society as a whole. To prevent crime, I think it is necessary to consider ways to crimi nalize hate crime and to impose aggravated punishment according t o the nature of hate crime law. It is necessary to consider revising t he current law to allow national agencies to conduct hate crime stat istics surveys to analyze the damage. Also, I think it is necessary to consider policy to order the offender's education program to preven t hate crimes and reduce repeat offenses. However, if hate crime le gislation is practically difficult, it is necessary to add hate crime mo tivation to the sentencing standards of the sentencing committee.

ABSTRACT How and why states legislate against hate crime and what role various actors – including human rights movements and international bodies – play in enacting change is attracting increased scholarly interest. Drawing upon primary, mixed-methods research, with Poland as our case study, this paper seeks to understand how new transnational advocacy opportunities change the way local activists push for improved legal protection from anti-LGBT violence. Using Keck and Sikkink’s (1998) ‘boomerang’ model as our interpretative frame, we observe how Polish LGBT groups systematically work with intersectional and transnational networks to feed their grievances to international human rights institutions, which, in turn, apply pressure on the government to amend hate crime laws. We argue that such externalisation of hate crime as a policy issue is a result of the closing of political opportunity structures at home and the simultaneous appearance of advocacy opportunities abroad along with increased resources being made available to the LGBT movement. While the state still hesitates to change the law, there are signs that calls for a new approach to addressing hate crime, promoted by activists and international organisations, are increasingly being heard by bureaucrats in Warsaw, even if there is currently no political will to make any changes.

This article discusses the Royal Commission of Inquiry's recommendation to reform New Zealand's hate crime legislation following the Christchurch terror attack. New Zealand currently uses a sentencing enhancement provision that has faced much criticism for being unable to reflect the serious nature of hate-motivated offending. It is also poorly enforced. The Commission recommended replicating the United Kingdom's approach by creating separate hate crime offences. This article argues that this is not the most productive way to combat hateful conduct and achieve the Commission's broader goal of social cohesion. Evidence from the United Kingdom suggests that many of the intended benefits of separate offences do not eventuate in practice. This article considers that criminalisation is not the best way to address hateful conduct generally. Hate crime laws risk being counter-productive and are unlikely to change societal attitudes. The conclusion is that it would be more beneficial to focus on non-criminal anti-hate responses, such as education. These alternative anti-hate methods will be more likely to address the root causes of hostility, prevent the development of hateful attitudes and thus reduce the frequency of hate-motivated offending in New Zealand.