UC Santa Barbara

Both scholars and public commentators are rightly concerned about the future of democracy in the US. A coalescing set of phenomena contribute to backsliding and the threat of authoritarianism and even violence. One key contributor is affective polarization, which hamstrings institutions and creates animus among citizens, leading to cascades of problems. Another is racial identity, especially as it leads to a backlash among social conservatives to changing demographics, decades-long advancements in civil rights, and the loss of the cultural dominance they once enjoyed. Racial resentment is tied to many of the array of problems connected to populist and extremist politics in the US. While scholars have developed a rich understanding of polarization and racial identity politics, these phenomena are primarily understood separately. Yet, there are theoretical reasons to expect that these may intersect. The key to the potential intersection of affective polarization and racial resentment is people’s assumptions about race and partisanship, especially about Black Americans. Since the realignment of the South with the Republican Party, the Democratic Party is more strongly associated with civil rights. The public widely assumes Black Americans vote overwhelmingly Democratic. For example, in the 2016, 2018, and 2020 elections, over 90% voted for Democratic candidates. With racial and partisan identity linked in people’s minds, the implications for an interesting question about which little is known is the following: Do racial attitudes, including racial resentment, interact with affective polarization, and if so, how? That question motivates this study. Utilizing a randomized survey experiment (n=1126), this study explores the impact of messaging that challenges the assumptions about racial and partisan identities. Ultimately, the experiment produces null statistical results. Finally, I explore the possibilities for the null results and offer suggestions for future research.