| This project examines American racial hierarchy, the role political elites play in sustaining it, and some of the psychological consequences associated with elite endorsement of racial hierarchy. The first substantive chapter (chapter 2) provides a discussion of political elites and why they make strategic use of group identities, the antecedents of group membership and group-based hierarchy, and the general mechanisms used by political elites to sustain American racial based hierarchies. The second substantive chapter (chapter 3), in continuing my discussion of the mechanisms used to sustain racial hierarchy, places a more explicit focus on the role of system justifying ideologies and presents the results of an experiment designed to illustrate how political elites can use these ideologies to advance racial hierarchy, particularly among White Americans. The third and final substantive chapter (chapter 4) continues my discussion of elite influence over attitudes associated with racial hierarchy, but focuses on elite effects that occur below conscious awareness, and presents the results of an Implicit Association Test that was designed to test these effects. Results indicate that, among Whites, exposure to racial hierarchy-accentuating signals from political elites affects the extent to which individuals explicitly endorse race-based system justifying ideologies. Among African Americans and Whites, exposure to racial hierarchy-accentuating signals from political elites affects the extent to which individuals implicitly endorse race-based system justifying ideologies. |
