Changing political attitudes and behavior in a diverse America: incorporating individual and contextual determinants

2014-07-11A combination of forces—America’s increasing international presence, globalization, and the passage of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 which significantly altered the barriers and pathways to citizenship—has resulted in a dramatic change in the composition of the American populace. While the American polity in the early twentieth century was primarily White and native-born, today’s society is increasingly multi‐ethnic with a larger percentage coming from families who have recently immigrated. New immigration from Latin America, Asia, and the Caribbean means that these trends are likely to continue. However, it is not enough to recognize that the American public is undergoing radical demographic shifts—my research agenda is motivated by questions regarding the political attitudes of these new populations and the associated roles of group membership, policy and context. ❧ My dissertation develops a theoretical explanation for variation in political attitudes across race, ethnicity and immigration status. The dissertation has three principal components. In the first chapter, I critically analyze the current state of the literature on public opinion. I argue that while the population has dramatically changed, the theories and methodological approaches employed to understand public opinion have not. To strengthen theories of public opinion we must: 1) account for group‐level effects, 2) incorporate factors related to a groups’ reception and experiences in America, and 3) integrate the role that policy plays in structuring attitudes and behavior. In the second chapter, I compare perceptions of racial linked fate across the four largest racial groups in the United States. My findings suggest that variation in levels of linked fate across members of distinct racial groups may best be explained by factors pertaining to their groups’ immigration, experiences with discrimination, and position in the American racial hierarchy. In the third chapter, I utilize newly collected data to demonstrate that individual attitudes toward immigration policy vary considerably across race, ethnicity, and policy design. Furthermore, I find that the standard determinants of political attitudes—i.e. education, income, and partisanship—do not operate uniformly across groups