Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Assessing The Reliability And Accuracy Of Advocacy Group Data In Hate Group Research, Mark S. Purington

Masters Theses, 2010-2019

In the 1980s, the term “hate group” began to appear increasingly in American media reports, often referring to the Ku Klux Klan or various neo-Nazi activities. There is no legal definition of the term, as it is not illegal to belong to such organizations, and so the designation of hate groups generally falls to private advocacy groups that claim to track them, such as the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) of Montgomery, Alabama. When the media or academic researchers require data on hate groups, they often turn to advocacy groups, usually due to a lack of other sources and because …