In the Shadows of Ferguson: The Role of Racial Resentment on White Attitudes towards the Use of Force by Police in the United States

IntroductionThe current state of race relations in the U.S. has been shaken by an incident at Ferguson, Missouri, where a white police officer shot and killed an unarmed black teenager, Michael Brown. A New York Times/CBS News (August 19-20, 2014) nationwide poll recently revealed a vast divide between blacks and whites in how they see the police in general and the shooting of Michael Brown in particular. According to this poll, blacks are more likely than whites to feel discriminated against by the police and feel the police are more apt to resort to deadly force against blacks than they are against whites. With respect to the Michael Brown case, blacks are more likely than whites to see the shooting as unjustified and are more likely to state that protesters have not gone too far. Given that both sides lay claim to wanting justice in the end, why is there such significant divide in perspectives? Research on white attitudes toward various racial issues, including racial policy aimed to alleviate racial inequality (e.g. affirmative action), the punitive nature of law-enforcement and law, continue to debate whether whites' views are grounded in a pure justice orientation or persistent racial animus (Green Staerkle & Sears, 2006; Kinder & Sanders, 1997; Soss, Langbein & Metelko, 2003). With that said, the purpose of this research is to assess whether white attitudes toward the use of force by police is impacted by feelings of racial resentment.Given the tenuous relationship between minorities and the police mentioned above and the general importance of the citizen/police relationship, a great deal of effort has gone into tracking public attitudes toward the police in the United States (Apple and O'Brien, 1983; Benson,, 1981; Bartsch & Cheurpraakobkit 2004; Brandl et al., 1994; Brown & Benedict, 2002; Cao, Frank & Cullen, 2006; Cao, Stack & Sun, 1998; Cullen et al., 1996; Dean, 1980; Decker, 1981; Dunham & Alpert, 1988; Flanagan, 1985; Furstenburg & Wellford, 1973; Hindelang, 1974; Liu & Crank, 2010; Rosenbaum et al., 2005; Lai & Zhao, 2010; Maguire & Pastore, 2004; Ren et al., 2005; Schuck, Rosentbaum & Hawkins, 2008; Scaglion & Condon, 1980; Sherman, 2002; Skogan et al., 2003; Tuch & Weitzer, 1997). Cao, Stack and Sun (1998) argue that understanding public opinion toward the police is important for three reasons, because: 1) citizens are consumers of police services and may reflect an accurate description of the job the police are doing; 2) a positive relationship between the police and citizens is important for police to do their job, and 3) while studying attitudes you can also study correlates of these attitudes. Generally speaking, studies suggest that, while suspicion toward state power exists in the U.S. (Bayley, 1976; Lipset & Schneider, 1983), Americans generally express positive attitudes toward the police (Brown & Benedict, 2002; Liu & Crank, 2010). The positive image of the police among U.S. citizens, as discussed above, is not uniform across social groups however. In evaluating the police, females, those who are older, hold a more conservative political ideology, have higher income and education tend to show higher levels of support than their male counterparts (Liu and Crank 2010). Most notably, and more poignant to this project, race and ethnicity have also been inextricably connected to police evaluation, with whites expressing more positive views than their racial and ethnic minority counterparts (Frank, Smith & Novak, 2005; Maguire & Pastore, 2004; Reisig & Parks, 2000; Skogan et al., 2003; Walker, Spohn & DeLone, 2000; Weitzer & Tuch, 2006). The lack of support expressed by minorities is often attributed to the tense and often strained relationship between them and the police (Weitzer & Tuch, 2006). Previous studies have also shown race to be strongly associated with opinions for and against the use of force by police, with whites more likely to accept the police using force than do blacks (Halim & Stiles, 2001; Skolnick, 2000; Stiles & Halim, 2001; Thompson & Lee, 2004; Weisburd et al. …