Local Political Party Voting Context Moderates Public School Principals’ Levels of Racial/Ethnic Discrimination

18 Pages Posted: 15 Apr 2024

See all articles by S. Michael Gaddis

S. Michael Gaddis

NWEA

Charles Crabtree

Dartmouth College

John Holbein

University of Virginia

Steven Pfaff

University of Washington - Sociology

Date Written: March 20, 2024

Abstract

Correspondence audits document causal evidence of racial/ethnic discrimination in many contexts. However, few studies have examined whether local political party voting context influences individuals to engage in “stakeholder-centric” discrimination on behalf of or in response to expectations of others. We examine heterogeneity in racial/ethnic discrimination by the county-level Republican vote share with a correspondence audit of 52,792 K-12 public-school principals across 33 states. We email principals posing as parents considering a move to the school district and requesting a meeting. We find evidence that the county-level Republican vote share strongly moderates racial/ethnic discrimination against Black and Chinese American families. While all groups are less likely to receive a response from principals as the Republican vote share increases, the declines for Black and Chinese American families are largest. Thus, discrimination against Black and Chinese American families is sizable in counties with the highest Republican vote share. These findings shed light on how partisanship can shape the experiences of historically marginalized groups. Furthermore, there may be benefits to targeting limited resources to geographies where discrimination is more likely to occur.

Keywords: discrimination, field experiment, correspondence audit, moderation, race/ethnicity, principals, public schools

JEL Classification: C93, I24, I21, I2, J15, J71

Suggested Citation

Gaddis, S. Michael and Crabtree, Charles and Holbein, John and Pfaff, Steven, Local Political Party Voting Context Moderates Public School Principals’ Levels of Racial/Ethnic Discrimination (March 20, 2024). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=4767032 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4767032

S. Michael Gaddis (Contact Author)

NWEA ( email )

121 NW Everett Street
Portland, OR 97209
United States

Charles Crabtree

Dartmouth College ( email )

211 Silsby Hall, 3 Tuck Mall
Hanover, NH 03755
United States

HOME PAGE: http://charlescrabtree.com

John Holbein

University of Virginia ( email )

111 Garrett Hall, University of Virginia
CHARLOTTESVILLE, VA VA 22903
United States
4342432899 (Phone)
22903 (Fax)

Steven Pfaff

University of Washington - Sociology ( email )

Seattle, WA 98195
United States

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