Transcript Race and Crime and Deviance

Race and Ethnic Relations (4/16)
1.
2.
3.
Systems dynamics (review)
Categorical Inequalities
The Issue of Exploitation
Race and Ethnic Relations in
American 20th c. Sociology

Park worked for a while as Booker T.
Washington’s assistant
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Figures such as DuBois and Cox
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Washington was a conservative Souther black
intetgrationist
Did path breaking work
But were marginalized in sociology
And eventually left the discipline.
Myrdal’s An American Dilemma was one of the
founding documents of 20th c. sociology.
Dynamic core of Classical
Theory in terms of feedbacks

Conflict theory
 Marx (DuBois)
 Positive feedbacks
 Alienation
 Rich groups get
richer…
+

Functional theory
 Durkheim (Gordon)
 Negative feedbacks
 Anomie

Functional needs:
universalism, solidarity and
integration
-
Conflict theory as a game of
monopoly
+
properties
+
rents
Or, more generally,
Resources
Wealth, property, social
position, power
influence, health…
+
+
Access to further
resources
This dynamic insures, that no matter what the
abilities or attitudes of the players, rich will get
richer and acquire more advantages and
privileges, so that the structure will polarize
Real world Monopoly
 In
Marxian analysis, property income is
one part of class polarization
 Which also involves exploitation: the
income at the top comes from below.
 But life-chances, power, status and
ideology are also important.
 E.g. income
wealth
education
Consolidation of social position involves multiple
resources: power, influence, status, etc
Functional theory as
thermostats
We have seen that 20th c. functionalism took
the maintenance of homeostasis in a biological
organism as its model.
 Parsons argued that the normative system
maintains social functions.

Violation of a
norm

+
-
Negative
santions
There is a process of integration and inclusion
 Norms develop toward universalistic inclusive
modern norms that are good for eve3ryone
Types of dynamic:
1.
Conflict theory in race relations:
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Positive feedback leads to exploitation and
domination
E.g. a game of monopoly
Rich and privileged groups get richer and
poor ones get poorer and exploited.
resources
+
+
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Access to more
resources
E.g. slaves, Indians, Hispanics.
E.g. education, status, power, etc.
The dynamic of monopoly:
resources

The dynamic of such positive feedbacks
is polarizing and discontinuous.
properties
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Access to more
resources
+
+
Rents (i.e. $ to buy and
improve properties)
but besides rents there is health,
education, status, power, etc.
People are always influenced by the
impact of policy choices on their life
chances and that of their kids..
Types of functional dynamic:
2. Functionalist theory in race relations:
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Negative feedback from normative system
E.g. controls in an organic system
Any goal directed or control system can be analyzed
as self-maintaining feedbacks.
Violation of
norms
+
Negative
sanctions
-
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E.g. a thermostat.
Parsons consolidated the notion of a movement
toward universalism and inclusion (assimilation.)
An example: An American
Dilemma (1944)

Gunnar Myrdal had developed various
economic feedback models in the 1930’s.
 His massive and influential analysis of US
race relations, An American Dilemma,
 was based on the concept of “cumulative
causation” i.e. positive feedbacks.
 He developed the analysis in the 1950’s and
60’s to deal with Third World development,
 And in 1978 he received the Nobel Prize.
1st Positive feedback: the vicious
cycle of minority deprivation

He argued that disadvantage produces
further disadvantage in a vicious, cycle.
 The advantages of an advantaged group
cumulate, and the disadvantages of a
disadvantaged group cumulate.
low income
poor health
low educational
attainment
low wealth
high crime rate
family disorganization
Implications of cumulation
 Many
of these relations have been
clearly demonstrated.
 The system is self-reinforcing.
 The response to a group’s disadvantage
must involve the many kinds of
disadvantage
 Race relations involve class.
2nd Positive feedback: racism
and minority deprivation
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Myrdal also argued that the poverty, unemployment,
crime or other disadvantages of a disadvantaged
group tend to generate or reinforce stereotyping,
prejudice, segregation and political marginalization.
And they are reinforced by them
Minority deprivation leads to racism
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(Stereotyping, attitudes, sentiments, segregation, political
marginalization and structures of white supremacy).
Racism leads to minority deprivation
Racism
+
+
Minority deprivation
Implications of Positive feedbacks

Myrdal argued that the cumulative
consequences of these feedbacks was a
cascade that appeared “natural”
 but that was socially produced, highly unstable,
 and amenable to social policy in the long run.
 In the same way that in increase in racism or in
minority deprivation produces a cascade of
further increases,
 A decrease in racism or in minority deprivation
produces a cascade of further decreases.
 The system is ameliorable precisely because of
positive feedback amplifications.
Negative feedback in An
American Dilemma

Myrdal argued that the main control system
was the value system he called “the American
Creed.”
 It calls for all persons and groups to have
equal opportunity, equal treatment by the law,
and equal life chances.
 The operation of cumulative causation
violates the American Creed, generating
pressure for reforms.
Racism
and racial
inequality
+
-
Pressure for
reforms to
reduce racism
and racial
inequality
Gordon: assimilation and the
melting pot

Milton Gordon argued that there was a long
term tendency to assimilation.
 There is.
 This analysis was firmly rooted in the Chicago
school.
 He was also aware of the problems and
limitation of “melting pot assimilation” as a
kind of domination.
 And of the obstacles to any assimilation.
Parsons: Inclusion and the limits
of Civil Rights.

Parsons developed the analyses of Myrdal
and of various people like Gordon to argue
that modern values are inclusive, and that
sociology is crucially concerned with
integration and solidarity
 This was the main message of the pattern
variables analysis.
 It was contested and non-trivial in the 1950’s
 It was limited to “civil rights”
Wilson, Tilly, and Feagin
the late 20th c. sociologists have stressed
ways that the structure of institutionalized
group inequality is cumulating.
 It does not undo it to stop the original
conditions.
 One needs reparations, affirmative action, or
proactive dismantling of the structure.
 All
W.J.Wilson
 President
of the ASA 1990
 Clinton policy advisor
 Analysis of the “Truly Disadvantaged”
as subject to a vicious cycle
 Analysis of Institutional racism
 Analysis of the employment origins of
the underclass.
Parts of the Wilson model
Racial discrimination
Jop flight
Concentrated Urban
poverty
Inequality
unemployment
Economic
cycles
Anti-bias laws
Few positive role
models
Underclass formation:
Illegitimacy
Flight of black middle
class
Increased no.
of poor
Anger
Limited
aspirations
Unemployment
Welfare, drugs,
crime, violence
Smaller pool of
employed men
Weak labor force attachment:
Social isolation, networks, work habits and histories.
The basic cycle of Wilson’s model
unemployment
Underclass formation:
Changes in
family
structures
Unemployment
Changes in the social structure of opportunities
Implications: It’s jobs; it’s jobs
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Short version:
1.
2.
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Ghetto poverty is largely a matter of black and
white, but that is because of history
drain out the jobs, and you have a pathological
structure 20 years later.
The patholgoical structure is self-reinforcing
But it can only be addressed in conjunction
with supplying jobs and access to jobs.
Implications: Culture and Social
Structure
 The
social structure of opportunities has
a powerful affect on family and
community structure and on the family
structure and attitudes.
 And those further influence the job
performance and skills.
 Neither can be changed in isolation.
 Both are central to racism.
Family and COP in Wilsons model
Concentrated Urban
poverty
Few positive role
models
Anger
Underclass formation:
Illegitimacy
Unemployment
Welfare, drugs,
crime, violence
Weak labor force attachment:
Social isolation, networks, and histories.
Civil Rights Law in Wilson model
Racial discrimination
Jop flight
unemployment
Concentrated Urban
poverty
Few positive role
models
Anti-bias laws
Flight of black middle
class
Limited
aspirations
Weak labor force attachment:
Social isolation, networks, work habits and histories.
Institutional racism
 The
analyses that focus on culture are
blaming the victim
 But the analyses that ignore or excuse
ghetto behavior are supporting a
pathology.
 One needs proactive policy that address
segregation and social isolation as part
of a job policy.
Why CR failed Wilson model
Racial discrimination
Jop flight
Concentrated Urban
poverty
Inequality
unemployment
Underclass formation:
Economic
cycles
Illegitimacy
Flight of black middle
class
Increased no.
of poor
Limited
aspirations
Unemployment
Welfare, drugs,
crime, violence
Smaller pool of
employed men
Weak labor force attachment:
Social isolation, networks, work habits and histories.
Civil Rights failed to address
1.
2.
3.
4.
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Segregation (e.g. Gattraux Project)
Social Isolation
Jobs
Overall inequality
I.e. the Myrdal analysis does not say things
must get better, and when last hired are first
fired, then in the absence of social policy,
they will get worse.
The problem of Exploitation
 Do
some people benefit from the
arrangements that hurt others?
 Does the question whose bull is being
gored influence one’s policy responses?
 Has white wealth been built on black
poverty?
 What is the leverage?
Leverage based on Exploitation
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In what ways does the benefits to the rich
provide leverage?
 One could say, “the only good Indian is a
dead Indian?”
 One could not say, “the only good worker is a
dead worker”
 One could not say, “the only good slave is a
dead slave”
 One could not say, “the only good wife is a
dead Stepford wife”
Tilly’s model of categorical
inequality

Exploitation: the privileged group benefits
from the labor of the exploited group and
creates divisions in it.
 Eg. South Africa, Women in the Corporation
 Opportunity Hoarding: the privileged group
benefits from maintaining restricted access to
jobs, etc.
 E.g. long Island vs. Marseilles