Self-selection versus Socialization Revisited: Military Service, Racial Resentment, and Generational Membership

Scholarship on racial attitudes has found that white veterans of World War II and the Korean War had more positive views of blacks than white civilians. However, more recent studies have argued that white veterans who have served in an all-volunteer force (AVF) now express more virulent views of bla...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Armed forces and society 2016-04, Vol.42 (2), p.362-385
Main Authors: Nteta, Tatishe M., Tarsi, Melinda R.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Armed forces
Attitudes
Civil war
Cooperation
Elections
Hostility
Korean War
Membership
Military personnel
Military service
Race relations
Racism
Scholarship
Socialization
Veterans
War
World War II
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Summary:Scholarship on racial attitudes has found that white veterans of World War II and the Korean War had more positive views of blacks than white civilians. However, more recent studies have argued that white veterans who have served in an all-volunteer force (AVF) now express more virulent views of blacks. Using data from the 2010–2012 Cooperative Congressional Election Study, we explore whether military service continues to predict positive racial attitudes. We find that white veterans express more negative views of blacks relative to white civilians and that white veterans in the AVF generation exhibit the most negative views of blacks. Taken together, we believe that our results suggest a reassessment of the role of contemporary military experiences in liberalizing white racial attitudes and offer support for the self-selection perspective.
ISSN:0095-327X
1556-0848
DOI:10.1177/0095327X15580115