Still Life in Black and White: Effects of Racial and Class Attitudes on Prospects for Residential Integration in Atlanta |
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| Authors: | Jeffrey M. Timberlake |
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| Affiliation: | Is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Sociology at the University of Chicago. His primary research interests include residential mobility, race and ethnic relations, and the intersections of race, class, and gender in producing social stratification. In addition, he is examining the effects of family structure on childhood well-being (with Patrick Heuveline) and the determinants of public support for drug control policy (with Kenneth A. Rasinski and Eric D. Lock). |
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| Abstract: | I use the 1993 Atlanta Survey of Urban Inequality to evaluate the effects of five types of racial and class attitudes on assessments of the desirability of residential integration: (1) preferences for neighbors of the same race, (2) perceived racial differences in social class characteristics, (3) Whites'perceptions of group threat from Blacks, (4) Blacks'perceptions of discrimination, and (5) negative racial stereotypes. For Whites the strongest predictors of resistance to integration are negative racial stereotypes and perceptions of group threat from Blacks. For Blacks in-group preferences, negative racial stereotypes and, to a small extent, beliefs that Whites tend to discriminate against other groups are positively associated with resistance to integration. I conclude by arguing that since racial attitudes are linked to attitudes about residential integration, open housing advocates should focus their efforts on addressing persistent racial mistrusts and prejudices. |
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