The Race Politics Makes: Parties, Polarization, and Whites’ Racial Attitudes By Andrew M. Engelhardt Dissertation Submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of Vanderbilt University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY in Political Science May 31, 2019 Nashville, Tennessee Approved: Professor Cindy Kam Professor Allison Anoll Professor Efren´ Perez´ Professor Marc Hetherington Professor Daniel Gillion To Pennie and Jeff, for sparking my sense of wonder and to everyone else who nurtured it along the way. ii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I always like reading the acknowledgements sections of articles and books because they give some insight into the structure that helped make a project a reality. I hope to do justice to those who have helped me on this wonderful journey because so many people deserve recognition for the contributions that allowed this document to exist. As an undergraduate at the College of William & Mary, Larry Evans, Paul Manna, Ron Rapoport, and Jaime Settle showed me the science in political science. Ron, in particular, deserves the great- est share of responsibility for my current trajectory. My dissertation committee–Cindy Kam, Marc Hetherington, Efren´ Perez,´ Allison Anoll, and Daniel Gillion–contributed immeasurably with their advice, technical know-how, and encourage- ment. They not only helped this project turn into the work that it is, but aided my personal and professional development. Cindy provided the steady hand and guidance I needed to make this project what it is. Her support was critical for helping me sift through the mess of ideas I had at the start of the process and her generosity with her time and advice is unparalleled. I wouldn’t be who or where I am without her help. This project’s core would not have existed without Marc’s field seminar in American politics. One week he began class by holding up two figures and saying that someone should explain them. One plotted average levels of racial resentment over time by party from 1986-2008. The other consisted of histograms of racial resentment by party included in the same time period. These figures appear in the appendix for Chapter 4. Marc provided the little nudge that started me on this adventure. Efren´ introduced me to the theoretical frameworks I use to answer these questions. He guided me through my initial foray into political psychology and generously found time to lead myself and Maggie Deichert in learning more about the influence identities have on politics. Efren´ also taught me how to celebrate the positive moments in projects because even if seemingly small they iii make this endeavor worthwhile. Allison taught me much about the profession and the art of creating a dissertation. She also gave me the space to talk through my often-convoluted thinking. From work-shopping ideas in her class, to providing critical feedback on dissertation chapters and other articles, Allison helped me improve my projects while consistently encouraging me to think about ways scholarship can make a difference. Daniel was generous with his time and advice on particularly technical matters. He was instru- mental in helping me get the text analysis approach off the ground. Without him the project would have been substantially worse off. The work I include also benefitted substantially from insightful discussion and incisive feed- back from Larry Bartels, Taylor Carlson, Paul Goren, Jonathan Klingler, Alex Theodoridis, the Vanderbilt Research on Individuals, Politics, and Society lab group, and audiences at the Univer- sity of California, San Diego’s Race Workshop and iterations of the APSA and MPSA conferences. Others in the department helped make this project the best it could be by giving me a space to brainstorm and the headspace to see things through. Josh Clinton, Maggie Deichert, Claire Evans, John Geer, Jon Hiskey, Dave Lewis, Scott Limbocker, Bruce Oppenheimer, Bryan Rooney, Brad Smith, Marc Trussler, Bryce Williams-Tuggle, Steve Utych, and Sheahan Virgin all helped make me feel at home and supported both personally and professionally. Outside of the department, Dan, Jesse, and Raena ensured that my knowledge was not simply applied to political science and Diane, Jessica, and Shawn helped make these experiences excellent. Tina Bembry, Darlene Davidson, Natasha Duncan, Shannon Meldon-Corney, and Melissa Van- dewater made the day-to-day work experience run incredibly smooth. Without them the department would have be much more difficult to navigate. Meg Schwenzfeier deserves special recognition for joining me in this process, even mostly from afar. Sometimes much more important things like presidential campaigns and graduate school get in the way. Thank you for everything, from Tiny PhD House on. Finally, my parents Pennie and Jeff, to whom I dedicate this document, inspired me to wonder iv about the world around me, pushed me to think about ways I can make a difference, and supported me in my many pursuits. To everyone: thank you for the consistent reminder that you never walk alone. v TABLE OF CONTENTS Page DEDICATION . ii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS . iii LIST OF TABLES . viii LIST OF FIGURES . xi Chapter 1 Introduction . 1 2 The Content of their Coverage: How Partisan Media Discuss Race . 7 2.1 Stylized Accounts of Racially Liberal and Conservative Rhetoric . 10 2.2 Measuring Racially Conservative and Liberal Rhetoric . 12 2.3 Divided Racially Liberal and Conservative Views on Policing in Ferguson . 15 2.4 Racially Liberal and Conservative Partisan Elites Consistently Talk About Race . 19 2.5 Racially Liberal and Conservative Themes in Partisan Media . 20 2.6 Conclusion . 29 3 The Limits of Agenda Setting? Framing Race’s Importance . 32 3.1 Elite Racial Rhetoric and Public Perceptions . 34 3.2 Partisan Media as Agenda Setters . 36 3.3 Data and Methods . 38 3.4 Study 1: Partisan Racial Discourse Correlates with Judgments of Race’s Importance . 39 3.5 Study 2: Framing Affects Agenda Setting in an Experiment . 46 3.6 Conclusion . 52 4 Racial Attitudes Through A Partisan Lens . 54 4.1 Partisanship, Race, and Racial Attitude Updating . 56 4.2 Why Partisanship Should Matter for Racial Attitudes . 58 4.3 Data and Methods . 61 4.4 Racial Attitudes Dominate in a Political Context Defined Less by Party . 64 4.5 A More Polarized Context Makes Party More Influential . 66 4.6 2016: Sustained Party Influence . 70 4.7 Partisan Lenses for All? Awareness Moderates Dynamics . 72 4.8 Supplementary Analyses . 74 4.9 Conclusion . 75 5 Partisan Lenses For All or For Some? . 78 5.1 Political Engagement and Attitude Change . 80 vi 5.1.1 Education, Norms, and Attitude Change . 81 5.1.2 Political Interest and Information Exposure . 82 5.1.3 Political Awareness, Information Seeking, and Attitude Updates . 83 5.2 Data and Methods . 84 5.3 Education Bolsters Attitude Change . 87 5.4 Political Interest Also Encourages Attitude Change . 93 5.5 Awareness Drives Attitude Polarization . 96 5.6 Political Engagement’s Conditioning Effect Varies by Party . 103 5.7 Political Engagement and the Dynamics of Group Affect and Stereotyping . 105 5.8 Conclusion . 110 6 Partisanship and Racial Attitudes into the Future . 113 6.1 Patterns Continue . 114 6.1.1 Implications . 117 6.2 Future Work . 118 6.2.1 Whites’ Attitudes About Non-Black Minorities . 119 6.2.2 Non-Whites’ Attitudes About Blacks . 123 6.3 The Race-Party Link and the Nature of Democracy . 126 BIBLIOGRAPHY . 128 APPENDIX . 146 vii LIST OF TABLES Table Page 2.1 Stylized Frames of Racial Discourse . 28 4.1 Relationship between Whites’ Partisanship and Racial Attitudes (1992-1994) . 65 4.2 Relationship between Whites’ Partisanship and Racial Resentment in the 2008 and 2012 Elections . 67 4.3 Relationship between Whites’ Partisanship and Racial Attitudes (2012-2016 VOTER Survey) . 69 4.4 Relationship between Whites’ Partisanship and Racial Attitudes (2016 CCAP) . 71 4.5 Political Awareness’s Moderating Effect on the Relationship between Racial Re- sentment and Partisanship . 73 5.1 Correlations between Engagement Measures . 85 5.2 Education’s Moderating Effect on the relationship between Whites’ Partisanship and Racial Resentment . 88 5.3 College Education’s Moderating Effect on the relationship between Whites’ Parti- sanship and Subdimensions of Racial Resentment . 91 5.4 Political Interest’s Moderating Effect on the relationship between Whites’ Parti- sanship and Racial Resentment . 95 5.5 Political Awareness’s Moderating Effect on the relationship between Whites’ Par- tisanship and Racial Resentment . 97 5.6 Political Awareness’s Moderating Effect on the relationship between Whites’ Par- tisanship and Subdimensions of Racial Resentment . 100 5.7 Moderating Effect of Political Engagement Dimensions on the relationship be- tween Whites’ Partisanship and Group Affect . 107 5.8 Education’s Moderating Effect on the Relationship between Partisanship and Changes in Stereotype Endorsement . 109 6.1 Relationship between Whites’ Partisanship and Other Group Evaluations, VOTER Survey . 122 viii 6.2 Relationship between Whites’ Partisanship and Other Group Evaluations, 2016 CCAP . 123 6.3 Relationship between Partisanship and Racial Resentment, Latinos and Asians . 124 6.4 Relationship between Partisanship and Racial Resentment, Blacks . 125 A.1 Relationship between Media Racial Discussion and Race as Most Important Prob- lem . 153 A.2 Relationship between Media Racial Discussion and Placebo Most Important Prob- lem Evaluations . 154 A.3 Relationship between Media Racial Discussion and Race as Most Important Prob- lem, Racial Differences . 155 A.4 Descriptives for Racial Resentment Measures . 161 A.5 Relationship between Partisanship and Racial Attitudes . 165 A.6 Relationship between Whites’ Partisanship and Racial Resentment, Standardized Variables . 167 A.7 Relationship between Partisanship and Affect Differential, Standardized Variables 168 A.8 SEM Measurement Model Results . 170 A.9 Stability Coefficients for Partisanship and Racial Resentment . 170 A.10 Cross-Lagged Effects of Partisanship and Racial Resentment .