POLSCI 329S Chapter Notes - Chapter All: Collective Action, Social Forces, Social Status
11 May 2018
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x Immigrant conflict grouped into:
o 1. Immigrant-native conflict: non-violent or violent attacks on the immigrant group
o 2. Immigrant-state conflict: disturbances between immigrant minorities and state actors
▪ Rational or rage?
x Theory for immigrant conflict – interaction of economic scarcity and immigrant electoral power
o Conflict only occur in areas of economic scarcity
o Immigrant electoral power determines the type of conflict
▪ Electoral power immigrant-native conflict
▪ No electoral power immigrant-state conflict
x Similar to Trump
o Among the Republican candidates, Trump is uniquely appealing to voters who feel unfavorable
towards various minority groups
o And individuals who have a strong sense of white racial identity and the belief that jobs are
being lost to minority workers perception of economic scarcity and competition
x Features of the national immigration regime may influence the extent of local economic scarcity
o When regimes do not manage immigrant settlement specifically, economic conditions will be
significant
Poverty, Segregation, and Race Riots: 1960-93
x Racial conflict is not completely explained by residential segregation
x Theory: combination of high levels of racial segregation + interracial contact racial competition
x Social forces that create/maintain residential segregation and racial poverty can be considered
strategies to ensure white superiority
o When the strategies are threatened, white people may respond with other exclusionary tactics
x Increase in ethnic immigrants increases the salience of racial boundaries
o Growth in the salience of a white identity
x Findings: residential segregation does increase the intensity and rate of race riots
o Black poverty rates were not significant
x Emotions – important magnifiers and accelerators of conflict (Peterson)
x Emotions create sense of urgency, dramatically raise the salience of a particular desire
o Can explain compulsion
x Rational hoie theor annot eplain genoide and ethni violene eause…
o Collective action problems
o Consistency requirements regarding preferences
▪ Assumes that people have rank-ordered preferences
▪ Preferences must be transitive (if you prefer A to B and B to C, then you prefer A to C)
x As complex actors, we are motivated by both instrumental and non-instrumental emotions
o Motivated by group-based concerns
o Concerned about multiple aspects: safety, status, vengeance
x Theoretical framework focused on emotions is particularly helpful to understand ethnic conflict in
general
x Emotion: mechanism that triggers action to satisfy a pressing concern
o Raises saliency of one desire/concern over others
o Emotion helps select among competing desires
o Heightens both cognitive and physical capabilities necessary to respond to the situational
challenge
x Are emotions instrumental?
o According to some:
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