Justice in America

Mark Peffley is a Professor of Political Science at the University of Kentucky. He is co-editor of Perception and Prejudice: Race and Politics in the U.S. (1998) and the journal Political Behavior. His articles have appeared in numerous journals, including American Political Science Review, American Journal of Political Science, Journal of Politics, International Studies Quarterly, and Political Psychology. Jon Hurwitz is currently a Professor of Political Science at the University of Pittsburgh. He is co-editor of Perception and Prejudice: Race and Politics in the U.S. (1998) and the journal Political Behavior. His articles have appeared in numerous journals, including American Political Science Review, American Journal of Political Science, Journal of Politics, International Studies Quarterly, and Political Psychology.

“After decades of conjecture and speculation about a fundamental question about justice, Mark Peffley and John Hurwitz, finally, provide a rigorous and definitive analysis of how the different realities of African Americans and whites influence their perceptions of justice and their relation to the legal system. Through the use of new data collected explicitly to explore conceptions of justice and applying the latest experimental techniques, the racial differences in attitudes toward crime and justice are deep and seemingly inexorable. Justice in America makes clear the larger consequences and duplicity that come from individuals who are most must vulnerable to crime and who are most dependent on the legal system to also believe system is stacked against them. We are taught that fundamental beliefs about justice and punitive policies are at stack.” —Darren Davis, University of Notre Dame

• 1. Introduction; 2. Racial bias in the justice system: reality and perception; 3. The role of fairness; 4. The consequences of fairness: polarized reactions to police brutality and racial profiling; 5. The consequences of fairness: support for punitive crime policies; 6. Conclusions; Appendix A. National survey and survey items; Appendix B. Examining reciprocal effects of unfair treatment and neighborhood discrimination.