American Indian Poverty in the Contemporary United States

Little sociological attention over the last two decades has focused on the deprivation experienced by indigenous people. Fusing insights from American Indian history and the race and labor market inequality literatures, we address this gap in this article through a historically informed labor market analysis of poverty—an analysis that considers the pervasiveness of contemporary Native poverty, its potential basis in labor market opportunities, and the extent to which it has been patterned by two major demographic and economic shifts: (1) the rapid urbanization of the American Indian population and (2) the proliferation of tribally owned casinos. Findings reveal, most notably, the incredibly rigid and durable character of poverty for this population, historically and currently and across geographic space, and with little overall impact of local labor market opportunity. The presence of tribal casinos reduces such poverty, but only to a small degree and not nearly enough to compensate for sizable American Indian and white poverty differentials. Group history is key, we conclude, to shaping how space, labor markets, and economic development reduce or buttress relations of inequality.     

Self‐Efficacy About Sexual Risk/Protective Behaviors: Intervention Impact Trajectories Among American Indian Youth

For adolescents, normative development encompasses learning to negotiate challenges of sexual situations; of special importance are skills to prevent early pregnancy, HIV, and other sexually transmitted diseases. Disparities in sexual risk among American Indian youth point to the importance of intervening to attenuate this risk. This study explored the impact of Circle of Life (COL), an HIV prevention intervention based on social cognitive theory, on trajectories of self‐efficacy (refusing sex, avoiding sexual situations) among 635 students from 13 middle schools on one American Indian reservation. COL countered a normative decline of refusal self‐efficacy among girls receiving the intervention by age 13, while girls participating at age 14 or older, girls in the comparison group, and all boys showed continuing declines.     

Clearing the air: American Indian tribal college students' exposure to second hand smoke & attitudes towards smoke free campus policies

Objective: The purpose of this study was to examine knowledge, awareness, and support for campus smoke-free policies. Participants: 1,256 American Indian tribal college students from three tribal colleges in the Midwest and Northern Plains. Methods: Data are from an observational cross-sectional study of American Indian tribal college students, collected through a web-based survey. Results: Only 40% of tribal college students reported not being exposed to second hand smoke in the past 7 days. A majority of nonsmokers (66%) agreed or strongly agreed with having a smoke-free campus, while 34.2% of smokers also agreed or strongly agreed. Overall, more than a third (36.6%) of tribal college students were not aware of their campus smoking policies. Conclusions: Tribal campuses serving American Indian students have been much slower in adopting smoke-free campus policies. Our findings show that tribal college students would support a smoke-free campus policy.     

Being Authentically American Indian: Symbolic Identity Construction and Social Structure among Urban New Indians

This study investigates the individual and group level reconstruction of a racial‐ethnic identity. Specifically, we investigate the experience of “new Indians,” or people who did not previously identify as American Indian, but are now reclaiming this racial‐ethnic heritage. Because many new Indians lack both official (tribal and/or federal) recognition of their Indian status and the phenotypic traits associated with Indians in popular culture, their authenticity as American Indians is often questioned in interactions with others. We document how new Indians work to reconstruct the symbolic meaning of authentic Indianness by emphasizing specific values and actions rather than biological lineage. Moreover, we demonstrate how new Indians achieve interactional validation of their redefined Indian identities in the context of a proximate social structure.     

An Emergent Phenomenon of American Indian Secondary Students’ Career Development Process

Nine single‐race American Indian secondary students’ career development experiences were examined through a phenomenological methodology. All 9 participants were in the transition period starting in late secondary school (age 18). Data sources included individual interviews and journal analysis. The phenomenon of American Indian secondary students’ career development process comprised 7 themes, which were integrated into 3 interacting dimensions: introspective, relational, and contextual. Findings reveal unique career development processes for American Indian secondary students living in tribal settings, including career decision process, career options, outcome expectations, and self‐efficacy. Implications for school counselors and counselor educators are discussed.     

Indigenous studies and intercultural education: the impact of a place‐based primary‐school program

The article presents a student‐impact assessment of a model two‐year place‐based intercultural approach to indigenous education. Students at Lewis & Clark Primary School in Missoula, Montana, connected face‐to‐face with tribal educators and members residing in the nearby American Indian reservation. The program’s learning outcomes included impressive gains in knowledge of Montana tribes, fewer stereotypical images, enhanced consciousness about the histories and cultures of the place in which students’ reside, heightened appreciation for and connectedness with Native Americans, and increased cultural awareness. The power of the place‐based intercultural‐education approach is that K‐5 students can acquire cultural knowledge, break stereotypes, and develop new appreciation for, and interest in, diverse peoples and issues by directly experiencing the local context in which diversity resides.     

Adolescent Gambling on a Great Lakes Indian Reservation

SUMMARY

The gambling habits of adolescents and the relationship between gambling, other high-risk behaviors and self-esteem were investigated. One hundred eighty-five American Indian and non-Indian students in grades 7–12 in two schools (one tribal and one public) were surveyed on a Great Lakes Indian Reservation. The seventy-eight item survey replicated a previous study on another reservation. The instrument reported data by age, gender, school, ethnicity, socio-economic status, incidence of high-risk behaviors, self-esteem indicators, and incidence(s) of individual and family gambling. The results indicated statistically significant relationships between gambling habits, parental gambling, other high-risk behaviors, and self-esteem. These findings have implications for American Indian youth and their families, for tribal leaders making policy decisions, and for social workers who provide services to these communities.     

Questioning the Pro‐Poor Agenda: Examining the Links between Social Protection and Poverty

This article investigates an empirical puzzle. Taking the case of Botswana, how is it that poverty is so high, when the country largely conforms to pro‐poor growth strategies? This article suggests that the minimal role of social‐security policies partly explains the relatively high poverty levels. This hypothesis is tested in a large‐N study of developing countries which shows that broad‐based and generous, rather than pro‐poor, social‐security policies impact strongly on poverty levels. The analysis further alludes to other obstacles to poverty reduction, such as economic transformation, which may be combined with a pro‐active social‐policy agenda. Thus, poverty‐alleviating strategies should be refocused to allow for a wider and more coherent role for social‐security policies.     

Impact of Childhood Out-of-Home Placement on a Southwestern American Indian Tribe

SUMMARY

One of the defining characteristics of American Indian and Alaska Native communities is the removal of hundreds of thousands of children from their natural parents, extended families, and often, reservation environments. Though widely discussed, little is known about the sequelae of out-of-home placement among American Indians. In this paper we investigate the occurrence of out-of-home placement among 580 Southwestern American Indian tribal members. Out-of-home placement is examined here within a broad context of trauma, alcohol abuse and dependence, and other psychiatric disorders.     

Effects of federal programs on children: Absolute poverty, relative poverty, and income inequality

Since the 1996 welfare reform, federal spending on means-tested programs targeting the poorest children has decreased, while programs that benefit children in low-income working families have been expanded substantially. With this background, this study examined changes in the antipoverty and anti-inequality effects of children's programs between 1995 and 2007 using data from the Annual Social and Economic (ASEC) Supplements to the Current Population Survey (CPS). The findings suggest that although the poverty-reduction effects of the federal child programs increased between 1995 and 2007, the programs' effects on the reductions of children's absolute poverty gaps, relative poverty rates, relative poverty gaps, and income inequality all decreased. More importantly, the antipoverty effects of the federal child programs were most weakened for the poorest children (i.e., those in female-headed, immigrant, and nonworking families) between 1995 and 2007.     

Disowned by the Ownership Society: How Native Americans Lost Their Land

Over the past five centuries, Europeans have enclosed the global commons and, in the process, incorporated whole continents of aboriginal land. Some scholars argue that Indians in North America were spared the ravages of compulsory enclosure, having sold their land to non‐Indians through willing‐seller transactions and benefited from federal government trust and treaty policies. Moreover, where enclosure existed, it is widely believed to have ended as Indians converted to agriculture, thereby internalizing hard work, sedentary life styles, and allotted ownership. This study disputes such historical accounts and suggests a wave of new enclosures in accordance with recent U.S. Department of Agricultural minority lending policies. By discriminating against Native American farmers and ranchers, the federal government has enabled the erasure of title, livelihood opportunities, and cultural identity among Indian farming and ranching communities. Evidence from the Fort Berthold Reservation of North Dakota reveals the complex complicity of the federal government in Indian land erasure and points to a changing reservation geography that, even now, makes castaways of agrarian Indians.     

The Symbolic Dilemmas of Suburban Poverty: Challenges and Opportunities Posed by Variations in the Contours of Suburban Poverty1

Poverty has increased significantly in U.S. suburbs since the 1990s. What we know about suburban poverty is largely limited to demographic and economic information. Building off the organizational perspective approach, I use in‐depth interviews with nonprofit, antipoverty organizations in eight Pennsylvania suburbs to better understand the suburban poverty experience. My focus is on how organizations compete for external resources. By working directly with the poverty problem while also working in broader metropolitan political and economic fields of decision making, this “middleman” role ( Marwell, 2007 ) gives us insights into contemporary poverty dynamics for suburbs. I find that how suburban organizational leaders perceive the challenges they face, and what strategies they adopt to confront such difficulties, revolves around symbolic dilemmas posed by the history, distribution, and politics of poverty in the suburbs. Symbolic dilemmas cluster around three different situational contexts of poverty in the suburbs. I use this to develop a three‐part typology of suburban poverty: symbiotic suburbs, skeletal suburbs, and overshadowed suburbs. This typology has implications for future research and for policymakers interested in developing tools to appropriately address this pressing issue.     

Settler colonial power and the American Indian sovereignty movement: forms of domination, strategies of transformation

The article extends the multi-institutional model of power and change through an analysis of the American Indian Sovereignty Movement. Drawing upon cultural models of the state, and articulating institutionalist conceptions of political opportunities and resources, the analysis demonstrates that this framework can be applied to challenges addressing the state as well as nonstate fields. The rational-legal diminishment of tribal rights, bureaucratic paternalism, commonsense views of tribes as racial/ethnic minorities, and the binary construction of American and Indian as oppositional identities diminished the appeal of "contentious" political action. Instead, to establish tribes' status as sovereign nations, tribal leaders aggressively enacted infrastructural power, transposed favorable legal rulings across social fields to legitimize sovereignty discourses, and promoted a pragmatic coexistence with state and local governments. Identifying the United States as a settler colonial society, the study suggests that a decolonizing framework is more apt than racial/ethnicity approaches in conceptualizing the struggle of American Indians.     

The Impact of Migration on Poverty Concentrations in the United States, 1995–2000

Poverty is frequently conceptualized as an attribute of either people or places. Yet residential movement of poor people can redistribute poverty across places, affecting and reshaping the spatial concentration of economic disadvantage. In this article, we utilize 1995 to 2000 county‐to‐county migration data from the 2000 United States decennial census to explore how differential migration rates of the poor and nonpoor affect local incidence of poverty, and how migration reconfigures poverty rates across metropolitan, micropolitan, and noncore counties. We further examine the impact of differential migration rates on African American and Latino poverty rates, two groups that have experienced higher than average poverty rates and have a sizable presence in rural areas. Our analysis indicates that during the 1990s the poor moved at rates equal to or greater than the nonpoor, and that, especially in micropolitan counties, this movement tended to deepen existing poverty concentrations. Both African American and Latino migration patterns tended to reinforce existing poverty concentrations, a result similar to that of the population as a whole, although the migration patterns of both groups more severely exacerbated poverty in high‐poverty noncore counties.     

Political Science Perspectives on Poverty

ABSTRACT

The social science discipline of political science focuses on the study of political systems and political behavior. While political science has not developed a comprehensive theory of poverty, this article reviews political science perspectives related to the causes of poverty (culture of poverty and neo-Marxist theories of class), the role of government in addressing poverty (theories of distributive justice and public support for antipoverty policies), and political participation. The article concludes with recommendations for future research and implications for Human Behavior and the Social Environment curriculum.     

Poverty,Welfare, and the Livelihood Strategies of Nonmetropolitan Single Mothers*

Abstract Using the National Survey of Family Growth, we document nonmetropolitan and metropolitan single mothers' economic livelihood strategies. We have three objectives: (1) examine differences in employment, cohabitation, co‐residence with other adults, and welfare receipt; (2) evaluate how these livelihood strategies are associated with economic well‐being; and (3) identify key metro‐nonmetro differences in the effectiveness of these livelihood strategies in improving the economic well‐being of single mothers. We find surprisingly similar livelihood strategies in nonmetropolitan and metropolitan areas. Employment, cohabitation, and co‐residence are strongly associated with economic well‐being. However, nonmetro single mothers are less likely than metropolitan mothers to benefit economically from full‐time employment. Given our results, “work‐first” policies are likely to be less efficacious in nonmetropolitan areas. Indeed, nonmetropolitan single mothers are often “triply disadvantaged” compared to their metro counterparts; they experience higher rates of poverty, higher barriers to welfare receipt, and lower economic returns from other livelihood strategies.     

“Beating the Odds” Versus “Changing the Odds”: Poverty,Resilience, and Family Policy

Mixed in with national data on declining poverty rates are other signs that poverty, economic hardship, and inequality continue unabated. This essay examines: (a) the scope of poverty and the growing disparity in income and wealth; (b) the consequences of poverty of adults and children; and (c) strategies for improving their resilience. It is suggested that resiliency will be enhanced more by keen attention to national economic policies than by focusing upon individual personality characteristics, family attributes, or even unique community features. Drawing on a public health analogy, a focus on prevention (through sound economic redistribution policies) could significantly strengthen families and improve their well‐being.     

Moving “Up and Out” Together: Exploring the Mother–Child Bond in Low‐Income,Single‐Mother‐Headed Families

Bearing children is often viewed as negatively impacting the social mobility of low‐income single mothers. This analysis draws on 66 in‐depth interviews with low‐income, single‐mother participants in an antipoverty program in Boston. The author argues that the mother–child relationship is at the center of efforts by these single mothers to move out of poverty. Interviewees repeatedly expressed the primacy of their children's needs being met in order for them to move forward. Mothers tried to include their children in efforts to move out of poverty, thus fulfilling the role of a “good mother” while exhibiting proper behavior for a poor person trying to achieve economic independence. The data here highlight the limitations of policy initiatives that fail to acknowledge the centrality of children's well‐being to the lives of single mothers and suggest that the mother–child bond may be an untapped resource for policies and programs serving this community.     

The future of Indian gaming

The legal right for Native Americans to administer gambling on their land provides them with probably the most profitable opportunity currently available to generate tribal income. The federal Indian Gaming Regulatory Act which guarantees this right is frequently invoked in instances where Indian gaming is competitive with state or private commercial gambling interests. This article examines multiple aspects of the competitive conflicts which arise and provides some speculation about the future of Indian gaming.     

FIELD PRACTICUM EXPERIENCES OF BILINGUAL SOCIAL WORK STUDENTS WORKING WITH LIMITED ENGLISH PROFICIENCY CLIENTS

This article examines the broader historical context of American colonial Indian education policy, the challenges American Indian students face with successful performance in higher education today, the legacy of active resistance to culturally destructive educational policy, and the critical role of tribal colleges in preserving traditional prerogatives and values, while providing access to higher education for American Indian students living in the homelands. It examines the Council on Social Work Education's accreditation standard 6.0 and offers practical ways social work educators can collaborate with tribal colleges to further support indigenous social work education in culturally compatible and affirming ways to strengthen bicultural identity and tribal sovereignty.