Race And Representative Bureaucracy In American Policing PDF Download

This dissertation investigates the relationship between bureaucratic representation of minority groups, individual administrators' decision making regarding those groups, and the performance of public organizations. In the context of law enforcement, three papers seek to answer the following questions. First, does racial/ethnic representation change the behavior of white officers when they encounter citizens of color? Second, what is the level of minority representation at which we should expect that behavioral shift to occur? Third, how do the multiple identities (i.e., race, ethnicity, and gender) of officers impact their law enforcement activities? Using data on millions of traffic stops across multiple U.S. states and years that allow one to observe both individual officer behavior and organizational characteristics, the first essay finds that white officers are more likely to treat Hispanic drivers similarly to white drivers, when working alongside more colleagues of that ethnic group. Put differently, the ethnic disparities in policing outcomes are reduced with enhanced minority representation on police force. Building upon the first essay, the second one estimates the conditions under which that observed behavioral change happens. The analysis shows that when minority officers constitute approximately 9-11 percent of the force, white officer's law enforcement activities concerning drivers of color begin to become less biased. The third essay considers multi-dimensional identities officers possess simultaneously and finds evidence of intersectionality of race, ethnicity and gender in shaping police behavior. It also finds that congruence in identities between officers and citizens, especially intersectional match, produces less disparate policing outcomes. This dissertation makes significant theoretical contributions to the scholarship on representative bureaucracy by addressing three major gap questions in that body of work. It also has important implications for policymakers and practitioners seeking to reform law enforcement and lessen racial disparities in policing in future.