In this book, Ernest McGowen takes on an inquiry with a significance that does not diminish for race and politics scholars: As African Americans make significant gains in their socioeconomic status, does class affinity supersede racial identity? By focusing on an understudied group, suburban African Americans, McGowen demonstrates why this important question continues to elicit scholarly interest. Initially, one might conjecture that suburban African Americans, who, on average, have higher levels of income and education than their urban coethnics and who spend a significant amount of time interacting in mostly white networks, are more likely to prioritize their class identity over their race.
McGowen offers an account of suburban black politics that differs from this conjecture, however. To be clear, he is not merely interested in whether class concerns trump racial ones for suburban African Americans. Rather, the central question motivating his research is how the suburban environment, “especially the racial make-up of one’s neighborhood and social networks, affect[s] the political behaviors of suburban African Americans who have strong racial identifications and policy preferences aimed at aiding the racial group writ large” (p. 1). Guided by this inquiry, McGowen also seeks to investigate other specific concerns, such as whether or not racial homophily induces suburban blacks to seek networks outside of their neighborhood and workplace and whether or not the appeal of the black public sphere persists for suburban African Americans, especially in light of their geographic separation from historically black institutions.
The author argues that living in white suburbs heightens the discomfort that African Americans already experience with their minority status, because of the low likelihood of finding individuals in their networks who will engage in agreeable discussions about race-related concerns. Instead, he characterizes the white suburb as hostile to those who care deeply about racial issues. The evidence marshaled lends credence to his position. Using survey responses from the National Political Study, the Congressional Cooperative Election Study, and the American National Election Studies, McGowen finds that suburban blacks and blacks in majority white networks (neighborhood and workplace) hold political opinions that differ significantly from their white counterparts. For example, blacks in majority white networks are less likely than their white counterparts to trust governmental institutions and more likely to perceive the persistence of racial discrimination. Additionally, suburban blacks are more likely than suburban whites to subscribe to radical race-related ideologies, such as thinking that the government has failed in its obligation to ensure equality for African Americans.
McGowen also shows that the diverging perspectives on race-related issues make suburban blacks uncomfortable in their proximate environment. Compared to suburban whites, suburban African Americans are less likely to perceive the views of their neighborhood network as aligning with their own outlook. Given that the suburban community does not provide African Americans with the resources and opportunities for political participation aimed at advancing racial group interests, suburban blacks seek these opportunities elsewhere, in networks such as the black church.
According to McGowen, the rejection of their proximate network has clear implications for suburban African American political behavior. However, the author’s analyses do not merely center on the differences in political behavior among suburban blacks, suburban whites, and urban blacks. Rather, he also examines how varying levels of racial group consciousness among suburban blacks influence their behavior. While he finds differences between suburban blacks and other groups in the propensity to engage in certain kinds of activities, one of the most striking discoveries concerns vote activity and its implications. Suburban blacks are less likely to vote in House races than their white counterparts and urban coethnics. And suburban blacks with high group consciousness are more likely than urban blacks with similar levels of group consciousness and suburban blacks with low group consciousness to roll off their ballots, that is, to vote for president but abstain from voting in congressional races.
McGowen attributes this tendency to the limited appeal that local House races offer to suburban blacks given the supply of candidates who are unlikely to care about racial issues. As a consequence, suburban blacks, especially those with high levels of group consciousness, devote more resources to alternative forms of participation, such as donating money to religious organizations and attending meetings and protests. In fact, the author finds that suburban blacks with high group consciousness engage in these activities at high rates, and at significantly higher rates than suburban blacks with low group consciousness. Overall, the book convincingly demonstrates that suburban African Americans feel a strong affinity toward their coethnics, such that they will seek out alternative networks and other forms of political activities to reinforce their racial identity and advance racial group interests.
While the author exploits an impressive array of data to support his hypotheses, the book is not without limitations. McGowen contends that the discomfort of the neighborhood environment motivates suburban African Americans to engage in political behaviors that are likely to differ from those of suburban whites and even those of their urban coethnics, and he finds in some instances that black suburban status has statistically significant effects on political participation. This does reveal that there is something about suburban residence that affects the political behavior of blacks. However, does the effect stem from the environment’s racial unfriendliness or is it the product of something else? Given the appropriate controls accounted for and the evidence assembled by McGowen, it is reasonable to conclude that suburban racial antipathies are driving black suburban political behavior.
The conclusion would have been more convincing, however, had the author established a relationship between the rejection of one’s suburban network (suburban blacks who viewed the neighborhood network as least compatible with their views) and various forms of political participation. Unfortunately, undertaking this analysis would probably have been unfeasible given the limited number of black suburban respondents in the data. I suspect that the limited number also precluded the undertaking of other potentially important analyses, especially if the analyses had required partitioning respondents based on relevant variables. Thus, scholars interested in further pursuing the questions raised by McGowen would benefit by sampling a larger number of suburban African Americans in surveys, as well as designing questions that are tailored to specifically address the questions at hand. For example, if suburban blacks are indeed more likely to abstain from voting because of their disillusionment with the candidates supplied by their suburban environment, then survey questions should tap not only into the likelihood of abstaining from voting in local House races but also into the probability of abstention from voting in municipal elections. Furthermore, as the author notes, scholars could move beyond the survey method and consider using focus groups and interviews with suburban African Americans to better “contextualize the motivations behind [their] participation decision” (p. 144).
Overall, this book offers a persuasive account of how white suburbs affect the behavior and attitudes of blacks living in them. Rather than reflecting major flaws in the study, the book’s limitations direct scholars toward fruitful opportunities for building upon what McGowen has produced. African Americans in White Suburbia makes a valuable contribution to the fields of ethnic politics, political behavior, and urban politics and should be taken seriously, especially by scholars working at the intersection of these fields.
