Public Opinion Quarterly Advance Access originally published online on September 26, 2007
Public Opinion Quarterly 2007 71(4):560-587; doi:10.1093/poq/nfm034
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Black Class Exceptionalism
Insights from Direct Democracy on the Race Versus Class Debate
ZOLTAN L. HAJNAL is Associate Professor of Political Science, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093-0521, USA. The author wishes to thank Neal Beck, Amy Bridges, Darren Davis, Paul Frymer, Claudine Gay, Andrew Grant Thomas, Jennifer Hochschild, Sam Kernell, Taeku Lee, Chris Parker, John Skrentny, and Barbara Walter for helpful comments on earlier drafts.
e-mail: zhajnal{at}ucsd.edu.
What implications does the growing economic divide between poor and middle class blacks have for the political arena? Traditional accounts suggest that increased economic diversity should lead to increased political division as the middle class becomes more conservative. Others maintain that race will continue to trump class because of ongoing racial inequality and widespread racial discrimination. I argue for a third alternative. I suggest that for blacks and possibly for other racial minorities increasing class status reinforces race. Class gains may increase the salience of race because economic success often means working in a predominantly white world and experiencing discrimination more regularly. I test these theories using the vote in direct democracy. I find that middle class blacks are more rather than less likely to support a liberal or black agenda. Class works differently for African Americans than for whites.