Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-qsmjn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-23T15:20:14.077Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Whites' Opposition to “Busing”: Self-interest or Symbolic Politics?*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 August 2014

David O. Sears ,
Carl P. Hensler  and
Leslie K. Speer
David O. Sears
Affiliation:
University of California, Los Angeles
Carl P. Hensler
Affiliation:
University of California, Los Angeles
Leslie K. Speer
Affiliation:
University of California, Los Angeles
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This article contrasts the “self-interest” and “symbolic politics” explanations for the formation of mass policy preferences and voting behavior. Self-interested attitudes are defined as those supporting policies that would maximize benefits and minimize costs to the individual's private material well-being. The “symbolic politics” model emphasizes pressures to make adulthood attitudes consistent with the residues of preadult socialization. We compare the two models in terms of their ability to account for whites' opposition to busing school children for racial integration of the public schools, and the role of the busing issue in presidential voting decisions, using the 1972 Center for Political Studies election study. Regression analysis shows strong effects of symbolic attitudes (racial intolerance and political conservatism) on opposition to busing, and of the busing issue on presidential voting decisions. Self-interest (e.g., having children susceptible to busing) had no significant effect upon either. It is concluded that self-interest is often overestimated as a determinant of public opinion and voting behavior because it is too rarely directly assessed empirically.

Type
Research Article
Information
American Political Science Review , Volume 73 , Issue 2 , June 1979 , pp. 369 - 384
Copyright
Copyright © American Political Science Association 1979

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

*

An earlier version of this article was presented at the 1977 annual meeting of the American Psychological Association in San Francisco. The research was supported by a National Science Foundation grant to the first author, and by intramural funds administered by the UCLA Central Computing Network. We are indebted to numerous colleagues for their helpful comments, especially Jack Citrin, M. Stephen Weatherford, Harold B. Gerard, Donald R. Kinder, John B. McConahay, Thad Brown, John Petrocik, Arthur Miller, Warren Miller, Tom R. Tyler, Richard Lau, H. M. Allen, Robert Abelson, Sam Kernell, Christine Rossell, and Barbara Gutek, none of whom should be blamed for the persistence of any interpretations with which they still disagree.

References

Abelson, Robert P., Aronson, Eliot, McGuire, William J., Newcomb, Theodore M., Rosenberg, Milton J., and Tannenbaum, Percy H. (1968). Theories of Cognitive Consistency: A Sourcebook. Chicago: Rand McNally.Google Scholar
Allen, Harris M. Jr., and Sears, David O. (1978). “Whites' Opposition to Busing in Los Angeles: Is Self-interest Rejuvenated?” Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Psychological Association, Toronto.Google Scholar
Arcelus, Francisco, and Meltzer, Allan H. (1975). “The Effect of Aggregate Economic Variables on Congressional Elections.” American Political Science Review 69:1232–39.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Armor, David (1972). “The Evidence on Busing.” The Public Interest Summer: 90–126.Google Scholar
Becker, John F., and Heaton, Eugene E. Jr., (1967). “The Election of Senator Edward W. Brooke.” Public Opinion Quarterly 31: 346–58.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Berelson, Bernard R., Lazarsfeld, Paul F., and McPhee, William N. (1954). Voting: A Study of Opinion Formation in a Presidential Election. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Bloom, Howard S., and Price, Douglas H. (1975). “Voter Response to Short-Run Economic Conditions: The Asymmetric Effect of Prosperity and Recession.” American Political Science Review 69: 1240–54.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brody, Richard A., and Sniderman, Paul M. (1977). “From Life Space to Polling Place: The Relevance of Personal Concerns for Voting Behavior.” British Journal of Political Science 7: 337–60.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Campbell, Angus (1971). White Attitudes toward Black People. Ann Arbor, Michigan: Institute for Social Research.Google Scholar
Campbell, Angus, Converse, Philip E., Miller, Warren E., and Stokes, Donald E. (1960). The American Voter. New York: Wiley.Google Scholar
Campbell, Donald T. (1965). “Ethnocentric and Other Altruistic Motives.” In Levine, David (ed.), Nebraska Symposium on Motivation. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press.Google Scholar
Converse, Philip E. (1964). “The Nature of Belief Systems in Mass Publics.” In Apter, David E. (ed.), Ideology and Discontent. New York: Free Press.Google Scholar
Downs, Anthony (1957). An Economic Theory of Democracy. New York: Harper and Row.Google Scholar
Edelman, Murray (1971). Politics as Symbolic Action. Chicago: Markham.Google Scholar
Erbe, Brigitte M. (1977). “On ‘the Politics of School Busing.’” Public Opinion Quarterly 41: 113–17.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fiorina, Morris P. (1978). “Economic Retrospective Voting in American National Elections: A Micro-analysis.” American Journal of Political Science 22:426–43.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gatlin, Douglas S., Giles, Micheal W., and Cataldo, Everett F. (1978). “Policy Support within a Target Group: The Case of School Desegregation.” American Political Science Review 72: 985–95.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Katz, Daniel (1960). “The Functional Approach to the Study of Attitudes.” Public Opinion Quarterly 24: 163–204.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kelley, Jonathan (1974). “The Politics of School Busing.” Public Opinion Quarterly 38: 23–39.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kinder, Donald R., and Kiewiet, D. R. (1979). “Economic Grievances and Political Behavior: The Role of Personal Discontents and Collective Judgments in Congressional Voting.” American Journal of Political Science 23: in press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kinder, Donald R., and Sears, David O. (1978). “Symbolic Racism vs. Racial Threats to ‘the Good Life.’” Unpublished manuscript, Yale University.Google Scholar
Lau, Richard R., Brown, Thad A., and Sears, David O. (1978). “Self-Interest and Civilians' Attitudes toward the Vietnam War.” Public Opinion Quarterly 42:464–83.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Klapper, Joseph T. (1960). The Effects of Mass Communications. New York: Free Press.Google Scholar
Lipset, Seymour M. (1960). Political Man. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday.Google Scholar
Lipset, Seymour M., and Schneider, William. (1978). “The Bakke Case: How Would it Be Decided at the Bar of Public Opinion?” Public Opinion 1: 38–44.Google Scholar
McConahay, John B., and Hawley, Willis D. (1977). “Is it the Buses or the Blacks? Self-interest versus Symbolic Racism as Predictors of Opposition to Busing in Louisville.” Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Psychological Association, San Francisco.Google Scholar
Middleton, Russell (1976). “Regional Differences in Prejudice.” American Sociological Review 41:94–117.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Miller, Arthur H., Miller, Warren E., Raine, Alden S., and Brown, Thad A. (1976). “A Majority Party in Disarray: Policy Polarization in the 1972 Election.” The American Political Science Review 70: 753–78.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
National Institute of Education (1978). Violent Schools-Safe Schools: The Safe School Report to the Congress, Vol. 1. Washington: Government Printing Office.Google Scholar
Nerlove, M., and Press, S. J. (1973). Univariate and Multivariate Log-linear and Logistic Models. R–1306–EDA/NIH. Santa Monica, Calif.: Rand Corporation.Google Scholar
Page, Benjamin I. (1977). “Elections and Social Choice: The State of the Evidence.” American Journal of Political Science 21: 639–68.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pettigrew, Thomas F., Useem, E. L., Normand, C., and Smith, M. S. (1973). “Busing: A Review of ‘The Evidence.’” The Public Interest 30:88–118.Google Scholar
Reiss, Albert J. Jr., (1972). “Monitoring the Quality of Criminal Justice Systems.” In Campbell, Angus and Converse, Philip E. (eds.), The Human Meaning of Social Change. New York: Russell Sage Foundation.Google Scholar
Sears, David O. (1975). “Political Socialization.” In Greenstein, Fred I. and Polsby, Nelson W. (eds.), Handbook of Political Science, Vol. 2: Micro-political Theory. Reading, Mass.: Addison-Wesley.Google Scholar
Sears, David O. (1978). “The Jarvis Amendment: Self-interest or Symbolic Politics?” Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Psychological Association, Toronto.Google Scholar
Sears, David O., and Chaffee, Steven H. (1979). “Uses and Effects of the 1976 Debates: An Overview of Empirical Studies.” In Kraus, S. (ed.), The Great Debates, 1976: Ford vs. Carter. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.Google Scholar
Sears, David O., and Kinder, Donald R. (1971). “Racial Tensions and Voting in Los Angeles.” In Hirsch, Werner Z. (ed.), Los Angeles: Viability and Prospects for Metropolitan Leadership. New York: Praeger.Google Scholar
Sears, David O., Lau, Richard R., Tyler, Tom R., and Allen, Harris M. Jr., (1978). “Self-Interest versus Symbolic Politics in Policy Attitudes and Presidential Voting.” Unpublished manuscript, Department of Political Science, University of California, Los Angeles.Google Scholar
Sears, David O., Tyler, Tom R., Citrin, Jack, and Kinder, Donald R. (1978). “Political System Support and Public Response to the Energy Crisis.” American Journal of Political Science 22: 56–82.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Smith, M. Brewster, Bruner, Jerome S., and White, Robert W. (1956). Opinions and Personality. New York: Wiley.Google Scholar
Triandis, Harry C., and Davis, E. E. (1965). “Race and Belief as Determinants of Behavioral Intentions.” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 2: 715–25.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Tufte, Edward R. (1978). Political Control of the Economy. Princeton: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tyler, Tom R. (1978). Drawing Inferences from Experiences: The Effects of Crime Victimization Experiences Upon Crime-Related Attitudes and Behaviors. Ph.D. dissertation, University of California, Los Angeles.Google Scholar
Wall, M. (1973). “What the Public Doesn't Know Hurts.” Civil Rights Digest 5: 23–27.Google Scholar
Watts, William, and Free, Lloyd A. (1972). State of the Nation. New York: Universe Books.Google Scholar
Weatherford, M. Stephen (1978). “Economic Conditions and Electoral Outcomes: Class Differences in the Political Response to Recession.” American Journal of Political Science 22: 917–38.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weidman, J. C. (1975). “Resistance of White Adults to the Busing of School Children.” Journal of Research and Development in Education 9: 123–29.Google Scholar
Wilson, James Q., and Banfield, Edward C. (1971). “Political Ethos Revisited.” American Political Science Review 65: 1048–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wise, M. (1973). “Congress, Busing, and Federal Law.” Civil Rights Digest 5: 28–35.Google Scholar