http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs...stem-is-color-blind-black-people-really-dont/
White people believe the justice system is color blind. Black people really don’t.
Poli-Sci Perspective is a weekly Wonkblog feature in which Georgetown University’s Dan Hopkins and George Washington University’s Danny Hayes and John Sides offer an empirical perspective on the issues dominating Washington. In this edition, Sides interviews political scientists Jon Hurwitz and Mark Peffley about their book on how blacks and whites perceive the criminal justice system, and what it implies for Trayvon Martin’s death, George Zimmerman’s acquittal, and the aftermath. The transcript below has been lightly edited. For past posts in the series, head here.
Q: Your recent book is Justice in America: The Separate Realities of Blacks and Whites. What are those separate realities?
A: We found remarkable differences in how whites and blacks perceive the criminal justice system. Usually, when we speak about group differences—the “gender gap,” for example—the differences are in the range of 10 to 20 percent. But these differences pale in comparison to the gulf separating black and white perceptions of justice. Blacks are extraordinarily skeptical that the system can be fair, while whites see the system as essentially color blind.
Q: What’s an example of this gulf between blacks and whites?
A: We asked whether it’s a “serious problem” in their community that police “stop and question blacks far more often than whites” or that police “care more about crimes against whites than minorities.” On average, 70 percent of blacks, but only 17 percent of whites, considered these serious problems. And the courts were not immune from such skepticism, either: while about 25 percent of whites disagreed with the statement that the “courts give all a fair trial,” more than 60 percent of African Americans disagreed. Repeatedly, using every possible barometer, we found that blacks doubted the fairness of the justice system much more than whites.
Q: Why do blacks and whites have such different views of the criminal justice system?
Much of the difference comes down to either personal or vicarious experiences that people have with police and the courts. We found that African Americans, especially younger black men, were far more likely than whites to report being treated unfairly by the police because of their race. In fact, a recent Gallup Poll found that one of every four black men under age 35 said that the police have treated them unfairly during the last 30 days. Little has changed since our survey. And these contacts do not have to be personal. In a recent study we conducted with Jeffery Mondak, we found that the distrust felt by many blacks is compounded by their vicarious experiences. Many of their black acquaintances have also had similar negative encounters with the law.
Q: Are there factors that matter beyond personal or vicarious experiences?
A: So much of an individual’s judgment of the justice system comes down to perceived process. When African Americans see the enormous overrepresentation of blacks in correctional facilities, they assume there has been blatant procedural injustice—injustice due to prevalent biases in apprehensions, arrests, trials, sentencing, laws, and more. In his remarks Friday about the death of Trayvon Martin and the acquittal of George Zimmerman, President Obama himself described this view: “The African-American community is…knowledgeable that there is a history of racial disparities in the application of our criminal laws, everything from the death penalty to enforcement of our drug laws. And that ends up having an impact in terms of how people interpret the case.”
But in our data many whites (about 60 percent) believed that blacks deserve to be imprisoned more frequently. They often based their explanations of racial discrepancies in the prisons on racial stereotypes: Blacks, they believed, are more inclined to commit crimes or just less likely to respect authority. To a considerable extent, therefore, African Americans attribute outcomes to procedural bias, while whites are more willing to attribute them to character flaws of blacks.
Q: What consequences do those views have?
A: These separate realities are consequential in several important ways. First, when blacks are cynical and whites are sanguine about the justice system, they tend to interpret the behaviors of agents of the system (such as police officers and judges) through these lenses, leading to what might be a perpetual spiraling effect. In one study, we gave individuals a chance to explain the behaviors of police officers in different scenarios—for example, whether the police department could conduct a fair and thorough investigation into charges of police brutality. In one scenario, the brutality victim was described as white, and in the other scenario he was described as black.
Blacks believed that the police could conduct a fair investigation into brutality charges—but only if the victim of the brutality was white. If he was black, black respondents doubted that the police could be even remotely fair. To whites, however, the race of the victim was irrelevant. They tended to believe the police department could do its job fairly regardless of whether the victim of brutality was white or black.
In another scenario, we described a police search and arrest of two men, identified as either white or black, who were walking by a house “where the police know that drugs are being sold.” Again, when the two men were identified as black, African Americans were extremely skeptical about the circumstances surrounding the police search and were much more likely to think the police planted the drugs on the men. By contrast, whites trusted the police because they think the system is fair and color blind. Thus, in both the police brutality and the racial profiling scenarios, when either the victim or the suspects were identified as black, African American respondents reacted with great skepticism, whereas whites appeared to form their impressions in a racial vacuum, as if unaware of the many sources of injustice that blacks face on a regular basis.
President Obama talked about this discrepancy as well: “And for those who resist that idea that we should think about something like these ‘stand your ground’ laws, I just ask people to consider if Trayvon Martin was of age and armed, could he have stood his ground on that sidewalk? And do we actually think that he would have been justified in shooting Mr. Zimmerman, who had followed him in a car, because he felt threatened?” In these words, the president summarized the views of many African Americans that the justice system is not a level playing field.
Q: What are the consequences of these separate realities for opinions about how criminals could or should be punished?
A: The separate realities of whites and blacks affect those opinions too. Whites are significantly more likely than blacks to support capital punishment, three-strikes laws, and spending money building more prisons (rather than funding antipoverty programs) to prevent crime. Because blacks do not trust the justice system, they do not believe that punishment will be handed out fairly. But because whites do believe the system is fair and because they are more likely to hold blacks personally responsible for the crimes for which they are accused, they support considerably more punitive policies.
Given the pervasive cynicism and distrust among so many African Americans, as well as the belief in the integrity of the fairness of the justice system so prevalent among many whites, it was almost inevitable that responses to the Zimmerman acquittal would be racially polarized. Surveys have already documented far less support for, and far more disappointment with, the verdict among blacks than among whites.
In a recent YouGov poll 75 percent of black respondents said that they would have found Zimmerman guilty of a crime—39 percent said guilty of manslaughter, while 36 percent said guilty of murder. Among white respondents, only 34 percent would have found him guilty of one of the two crimes. The dominant emotions expressed by black Americans over the verdict were disappointment (53 percent) and anger (25 percent), whereas whites tended to say that they were pleased (25 percent) and relieved (21 percent) as well as disappointed (23 percent).
White people believe the justice system is color blind. Black people really don’t.
Poli-Sci Perspective is a weekly Wonkblog feature in which Georgetown University’s Dan Hopkins and George Washington University’s Danny Hayes and John Sides offer an empirical perspective on the issues dominating Washington. In this edition, Sides interviews political scientists Jon Hurwitz and Mark Peffley about their book on how blacks and whites perceive the criminal justice system, and what it implies for Trayvon Martin’s death, George Zimmerman’s acquittal, and the aftermath. The transcript below has been lightly edited. For past posts in the series, head here.
Q: Your recent book is Justice in America: The Separate Realities of Blacks and Whites. What are those separate realities?
A: We found remarkable differences in how whites and blacks perceive the criminal justice system. Usually, when we speak about group differences—the “gender gap,” for example—the differences are in the range of 10 to 20 percent. But these differences pale in comparison to the gulf separating black and white perceptions of justice. Blacks are extraordinarily skeptical that the system can be fair, while whites see the system as essentially color blind.
Q: What’s an example of this gulf between blacks and whites?
A: We asked whether it’s a “serious problem” in their community that police “stop and question blacks far more often than whites” or that police “care more about crimes against whites than minorities.” On average, 70 percent of blacks, but only 17 percent of whites, considered these serious problems. And the courts were not immune from such skepticism, either: while about 25 percent of whites disagreed with the statement that the “courts give all a fair trial,” more than 60 percent of African Americans disagreed. Repeatedly, using every possible barometer, we found that blacks doubted the fairness of the justice system much more than whites.
Q: Why do blacks and whites have such different views of the criminal justice system?
Much of the difference comes down to either personal or vicarious experiences that people have with police and the courts. We found that African Americans, especially younger black men, were far more likely than whites to report being treated unfairly by the police because of their race. In fact, a recent Gallup Poll found that one of every four black men under age 35 said that the police have treated them unfairly during the last 30 days. Little has changed since our survey. And these contacts do not have to be personal. In a recent study we conducted with Jeffery Mondak, we found that the distrust felt by many blacks is compounded by their vicarious experiences. Many of their black acquaintances have also had similar negative encounters with the law.
Q: Are there factors that matter beyond personal or vicarious experiences?
A: So much of an individual’s judgment of the justice system comes down to perceived process. When African Americans see the enormous overrepresentation of blacks in correctional facilities, they assume there has been blatant procedural injustice—injustice due to prevalent biases in apprehensions, arrests, trials, sentencing, laws, and more. In his remarks Friday about the death of Trayvon Martin and the acquittal of George Zimmerman, President Obama himself described this view: “The African-American community is…knowledgeable that there is a history of racial disparities in the application of our criminal laws, everything from the death penalty to enforcement of our drug laws. And that ends up having an impact in terms of how people interpret the case.”
But in our data many whites (about 60 percent) believed that blacks deserve to be imprisoned more frequently. They often based their explanations of racial discrepancies in the prisons on racial stereotypes: Blacks, they believed, are more inclined to commit crimes or just less likely to respect authority. To a considerable extent, therefore, African Americans attribute outcomes to procedural bias, while whites are more willing to attribute them to character flaws of blacks.
Q: What consequences do those views have?
A: These separate realities are consequential in several important ways. First, when blacks are cynical and whites are sanguine about the justice system, they tend to interpret the behaviors of agents of the system (such as police officers and judges) through these lenses, leading to what might be a perpetual spiraling effect. In one study, we gave individuals a chance to explain the behaviors of police officers in different scenarios—for example, whether the police department could conduct a fair and thorough investigation into charges of police brutality. In one scenario, the brutality victim was described as white, and in the other scenario he was described as black.
Blacks believed that the police could conduct a fair investigation into brutality charges—but only if the victim of the brutality was white. If he was black, black respondents doubted that the police could be even remotely fair. To whites, however, the race of the victim was irrelevant. They tended to believe the police department could do its job fairly regardless of whether the victim of brutality was white or black.
In another scenario, we described a police search and arrest of two men, identified as either white or black, who were walking by a house “where the police know that drugs are being sold.” Again, when the two men were identified as black, African Americans were extremely skeptical about the circumstances surrounding the police search and were much more likely to think the police planted the drugs on the men. By contrast, whites trusted the police because they think the system is fair and color blind. Thus, in both the police brutality and the racial profiling scenarios, when either the victim or the suspects were identified as black, African American respondents reacted with great skepticism, whereas whites appeared to form their impressions in a racial vacuum, as if unaware of the many sources of injustice that blacks face on a regular basis.
President Obama talked about this discrepancy as well: “And for those who resist that idea that we should think about something like these ‘stand your ground’ laws, I just ask people to consider if Trayvon Martin was of age and armed, could he have stood his ground on that sidewalk? And do we actually think that he would have been justified in shooting Mr. Zimmerman, who had followed him in a car, because he felt threatened?” In these words, the president summarized the views of many African Americans that the justice system is not a level playing field.
Q: What are the consequences of these separate realities for opinions about how criminals could or should be punished?
A: The separate realities of whites and blacks affect those opinions too. Whites are significantly more likely than blacks to support capital punishment, three-strikes laws, and spending money building more prisons (rather than funding antipoverty programs) to prevent crime. Because blacks do not trust the justice system, they do not believe that punishment will be handed out fairly. But because whites do believe the system is fair and because they are more likely to hold blacks personally responsible for the crimes for which they are accused, they support considerably more punitive policies.
Given the pervasive cynicism and distrust among so many African Americans, as well as the belief in the integrity of the fairness of the justice system so prevalent among many whites, it was almost inevitable that responses to the Zimmerman acquittal would be racially polarized. Surveys have already documented far less support for, and far more disappointment with, the verdict among blacks than among whites.
In a recent YouGov poll 75 percent of black respondents said that they would have found Zimmerman guilty of a crime—39 percent said guilty of manslaughter, while 36 percent said guilty of murder. Among white respondents, only 34 percent would have found him guilty of one of the two crimes. The dominant emotions expressed by black Americans over the verdict were disappointment (53 percent) and anger (25 percent), whereas whites tended to say that they were pleased (25 percent) and relieved (21 percent) as well as disappointed (23 percent).
