White Backlash: Immigration, Race, and American Politics

by Marisa A. Abrajano, Zoltan Hajnal

Overview

White Backlash provides an authoritative assessment of how immigration is reshaping the politics of the nation. Using an array of data and analysis, Marisa Abrajano and Zoltan Hajnal show that fears about immigration fundamentally influence white Americans' core political identities, policy preferences, and electoral choices, and that these concerns are at the heart of a large-scale defection of whites from the Democratic to the Republican Party.

Abrajano and Hajnal demonstrate that this political backlash has disquieting implications for the future of race relations in America. White Americans' concerns about Latinos and immigration have led to support for policies that are less generous and more punitive and that conflict with the preferences of much of the immigrant population. America's growing racial and ethnic diversity is leading to a greater racial divide in politics. As whites move to the right of the political spectrum, racial and ethnic minorities generally support the left. Racial divisions in partisanship and voting, as the authors indicate, now outweigh divisions by class, age, gender, and other demographic measures.

White Backlash raises critical questions and concerns about how political beliefs and future elections will change the fate of America's immigrants and minorities, and their relationship with the rest of the nation.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780691176192
Publisher:	Princeton University Press
Publication date:	02/28/2017
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	256
Product dimensions:	6.10(w) x 9.10(h) x 0.70(d)

About the Author

Marisa Abrajano is associate professor of political science at the University of California, San Diego. She is the author of Campaigning to the New American Electorate and the coauthor of New Faces, New Voices (Princeton). Zoltan L. Hajnal is professor of political science at the University of California, San Diego. He is the author of America's Uneven Democracy and the coauthor of Why Americans Don't Join the Party (Princeton).

Table of Contents

Illustrations vii

Tables ix

Acknowledgments xi

INTRODUCTION 1

PART I Theory 23

CHAPTER 1 A Theory of Immigration Backlash Politics 25

PART II Views on Immigration and Defection to the Republican Party 61

CHAPTER 2 Immigration, Latinos, and the Transformation of White Partisanship 63

CHAPTER 3 How Immigration Shapes the Vote 88

PART III Understanding the Roots of the Backlash 113

CHAPTER 4 The Geography of the Immigration Backlash 115

CHAPTER 5 Media Coverage of Immigration and White Macropartisanship 154

PART IV The Consequences 181

CHAPTER 6 The Policy Backlash 183

CONCLUSION Implications for A Deeply Divided United States 201

References 217

Index 233

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

"White Backlash is one of the best books I have read in the last half century. Based on rigorous analyses of multiple data sets and presented in remarkably clear prose, the book advances a compelling and original argument that will change the way we talk about immigration and electoral politics. I highly recommend this important work to anyone seeking an understanding of the current and growing racial divide in U.S. politics."—William Julius Wilson, author of More than Just Race

"Abrajano and Hajnal make an original and important contribution to understanding the opinions of white Americans about immigration. Using multiple sources of data, the analyses in White Backlash persuasively show that the politics of immigration will have long-standing consequences for U.S. democracy."—Jane Junn, University of Southern California

"White Backlash incisively looks at how the rapid growth and negative portrayal of Latinos have sharpened racial fears, leading whites to redefine the fault lines of race in the United States. The mass immigration of Latinos has yielded a new wave of resentment increasingly skewed along partisan lines. For those wishing to understand the bitter division between Democrats and Republicans in Washington today, White Backlash is essential reading."—Douglas S. Massey, coauthor of Climbing Mount Laurel

"In this ambitious, meticulously researched, and powerful book, Abrajano and Hajnal reveal the significant impact immigration has had on white political behavior and policy choices over the past three decades. This pathbreaking work will change how we think about the current partisan divide in the United States."—Lisa García Bedolla, author of Latino Politics

"In this book, Abrajano and Hajnal examine the deep and broad ways in which views on immigration have altered the partisan landscape in the United States. Relying on multiple sources, White Backlash makes a significant contribution to many areas in American politics, including partisanship, campaigns and elections, racial and ethnic politics, state and local politics, and political psychology."—Deborah Schildkraut, Tufts University

Editorial Reviews

"Not only a solid piece of political scientific research, this book should play a central role in understanding of US party politics over the next several decades. . . . A must-read."

Choice

"Winners of the 2016 Ralph J. Bunche Award, American Political Science Association"

Selected for The New York Times Book Review’s “The Year in Reading” 2016

One of Choice's Outstanding Academic Titles for 2015

From the Publisher

2015-01-08
Two University of California, San Diego, political science professors set out to conclusively establish the obvious.Supported by dense statistical analysis, Abrajano (co-author: Campaigning to the New American Electorate: Advertising to Latino Voters, 2010, etc.) and Hajnal (America's Uneven Democracy: Race, Turnout, and Representation in City Politics, 2009, etc.) contend that immigration is transforming United States politics by arousing in many white voters "a broad backlash that results in more restrictive immigration policy, more punitive criminal justice policies, less generous public spending, and a large shift to the right politically that results in more support for the Republican Party." But not all immigrants inspire this—"only one racial group—Latinos—is at the heart of white Americans' [negative] response to immigration." The authors further contend that this response is significantly driven by "an ongoing and often-repeated threat narrative that links the United States' immigrant and Latino populations to a host of pernicious fiscal, social, and cultural consequences," pushed by profit-seeking media. The force of the authors' argument is damaged by a consistent failure to differentiate among attitudes toward the entire Latino population, documented Latino immigrants and undocumented immigration by anyone, resulting in frequent references to "anti-immigrant" policies and documents that target illegal immigration but, in some cases, actually support immigration generally. This muddling of critical concepts is endlessly confusing and sits uncomfortably beside the authors' statistical charts. Also unconvincing is Abrajano and Hajnal's claim to have teased out attitudes toward Latino immigration from all the other reasons advanced by pundits for white voters leaving the Democratic Party. The authors ponderously demonstrate that white voters who oppose unrestricted Latino immigration increasingly support the party that shares their concern and resists paying for social services for undocumented immigrants. Not worth the effort.

Kirkus Reviews