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Research
Broadly speaking, my research interests fall into two categories, both lying at the intersection of politics and inequality. One strand of my research investigates the connections between economic dynamics and sociopolitical attitudes like support for capital punishment and attitudes toward feminists and the women’s movement. The other strand examines how inequality and politics intersect at the local level—that is, how economic inequality in communities generates political inequality in the form of differing levels of political participation—both for Hispanics and (in my dissertation) for Americans more generally.
Dissertation Research (the much-abbreviated version)
Almost thirty years ago, John Gaventa’s magisterial book Power and Powerlessness: Quiescence and Rebellion in an Appalachian Valley carefully and thoughtfully analyzed the ways in which political inaction, previously understood as active consent to the powers that be, can instead be a consequence of extreme economic and political inequality. But its nuanced and incisive theoretical insights are in a way overshadowed by its empirical limitations. Limited to a single county in Tennessee with a distinctive political and economic history, the findings of Power and Powerlessness cannot be extended easily across so diverse a country as America. So how does inequality influence political participation in America? Some researchers suggest that inequality lowers rates of political participation by convincing citizens (particularly the poor) that their government does not respond to their interests, causing them to withdraw from the political system in frustration or apathy. Or perhaps inequality erodes interpersonal trust and constrains the social interaction on which participation feeds. But others argue that inequality can instead make people outraged, which leads them to demand change from political elites through political action.
My dissertation attempts to reconcile these two strands of research. The key insight is to distinguish among the various dimensions at which inequality can exist by shifting the focus from economic inequality to economic segregation. While economic inequality refers to disparities in income among individuals, economic segregation refers to disparities in average incomes among geographic areas. Inequality among close-by neighbors may have consequences for political participation that differ dramatically from those consequences generated by inequality among neighborhoods. In neighborhoods with high levels of inequality, social interaction may be constrained, and politically relevant information may not diffuse readily—thus lowering participation. But where neighborhoods are themselves unequal—where some neighborhoods contain mostly rich people and others contain mostly poor people—demands for redistributive policies may be stronger, sparking political action. Thus inequality may have different meanings at different geographic scales, with different consequences for political participation.
Other Research In Progress
Contextual Effects on Hispanics’ Political Participation: Ethnic or Economic? (PDF) Abstract: Hispanics are a large and growing share of the U.S. minority population, but we know little about how the characteristics of their communities influence their political participation. Furthermore, previous research on largely Anglo white samples has yielded no firm conclusions on whether the ethnic and socioeconomic character of communities should have benefits or liabilities for political activities. Using U.S. Census data linked to a nationally representative survey of Hispanics, I show that the ethnic context of individuals’ communities has no apparent effect on any form of political participation. Community socioeconomic characteristics are more consequential: residents of low-income and economically heterogeneous areas are generally more likely to participate than are Hispanics living in wealthy and economically homogeneous areas. While these effects cannot be easily explained, they hold for immigrant and native-born Hispanics, newcomers and longtime residents, and citizens and noncitizens alike.
What Does Feminism Mean to American Men? (PDF) Abstract: This research examines the salience of feminism’s economic, cultural, and policy meanings to American men. Using data on 1,236 men from the 1992 and 2000 American National Election Studies and a multilevel regression model for paired outcomes, I find that feminism carries no apparent economic meaning, despite assertions that low-status and financially insecure men feel threatened by women in the labor force or value the extra income a spouse might provide. Rather, feminism’s meaning is more cultural: feminists and the women’s movement receive more positive ratings from men concerned with egalitarianism, and more negative ratings from men concerned with the survival of “traditional” moral codes. Yet the policy dimension is also important; men who oppose gay rights policies evince some hostility toward feminism. Finally, I find no evidence that “feminists” are identified with cultural and moral policy concerns or that “the women’s movement” signifies economic issues.
The Disappearing Income Gap in Whites’ Support for Capital Punishment, 1974-2004 (PDF) Abstract: This research uses the 1974-2004 General Social Surveys to examine the relationship between income and whites’ support for capital punishment across thirty years of recent American history—a period that has seen a dramatic shift. Low-income whites once were far less accepting of capital punishment than middle- and high-income whites, but these two groups now give about equal rates of support to the death penalty. This transformation appears to be due partly to changes in educational attainment across the 1974-2004 period and partly to increasing levels of racial resentment (before 1990) and political conservatism (after 1990) among low-income whites. Thus there is no essential dynamic of stratified societies that produces a class gradient in punitiveness; rather, the relationship is contingent on historically specific factors. |
