Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Racial Threat Theory: A Test Of The Economic Threat Hypothesis, Carl L. Reeds

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Racial disparities in the criminal justice system are well documented. While one potential contributor to these disparities may be differential offending on the part of racial groups, another alternative or additional explanation is racial discrimination. Blalock developed racial threat theory to explain macro-level discrimination. According to this theory various forms of “threat” posed by minority populations to majority populations leads to more formal social control or disparate formal social control, such as the formal social control that is imposed by the criminal justice system. According to Blalock, “economic threat” occurs when the Black population has large or increasing economic resources …