Minority threat, community disadvantage and sentencing
| Date | 03 December 2018 |
| Pages | 213-225 |
| Published date | 03 December 2018 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/JCRPP-02-2018-0009 |
| Author | Christine L. Arazan |
Minority threat, community disadvantage
and sentencing
Christine L. Arazan
Abstract
Purpose –Prior studies of criminal sentencing have largely focused on individual-level predictors of
sentencing outcomes. The purpose of this paper is to examine the effects of a variety of theoretically derived
community measurements of social threat and disadvantage on the criminal sentencing of convicted felons.
This analysis permits an evaluation of whether legal ideals such as equality before the law and policy goals of
equal treatment for like offenders are achieved.
Design/methodology/approach –The study examines data of individuals sentenced in the state of Florida
and community level measurements of racial and ethnic threat and community disadvantage. Hierarchical
generalized linear model is used to analyze the effect of these measures on the dichotomous in/out
imprisonment variable, and standard hierarchical linear regression analysis is used to model the continuous
dependent variable of sentence length.
Findings –The results provide support for the racial threat perspective though not for ethnic threat nor
community disadvantage. The findingsand their implications are discussed in terms of theory, research and policy.
Practical implications –Racial disparity in criminal justice practices is receiving increasing public and policy
attention, as evidenced by the growing Black Lives Matter movement. Regarding sentencing, racial disparity
remains a major research and policy question. While the current research and theoretical literature on
sentencing is not conclusive, it is clear that race matters. As a result, racial disparity in sentencing needs to be
a priority in subsequent “transitional criminology”efforts between researchers and policy makers to identify,
explain and ultimately predict exactly how race impacts sentencing, and how to reduce it as a consideration
from sentencing.
Originality/value –This study contributes to a growing body of literature that examines the social context of
punishments by using several community level measurements of threat and disadvantage, while modeling
the two-step sentencing outcome of imprisonment and sentence length.
Keywords Sentencing, Multilevel, Minority threat, Community disadvantage, Imprisonment,Sentence length
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
A significant body of literature exists that examines racial, ethnic and gender disparities in
sentencing. Past research commonly finds that sentencing is linked not only to offense-related
factors but also to defendant characteristics including race, ethnicity, gender, education level,
income and a variety of other “extralegal”factors, highlighting concerns about a fair and just
criminal justice system. Recent literature examining the contextual variations in sentencing
provides evidence that the sentence one receives depends not just on legally relevant factors like
the current offense and prior criminal history, or extralegal factors like race, gender and age, but
also depends on where one is sentenced (Ulmer, 2012). These findings highlight the disconnect
between policy goals of equal treatment for like-situated offenders and legal ideals such as
equality before the law, and require further exploration as to the extent these sentencing
decisions perpetuate patterns of social inequality.
Conflict theories with a focus on economic, racial and ethnic threat provide a framework for
explaining why defendants in communities that have larger proportions of blacks and Hispanics,
and who score high on other indices of disadvantage, are sentenced more harshly. This study
explores the empirical relationships between community measurements ofthreat and
Received 5 February 2018
Revised 24 May 2018
Accepted 24 May 2018
Christine L. Arazan is based at
the Department of Criminology
and Criminal Justice, Northern
Arizona University College of
Social and Behavioral
Sciences, Flagstaff,
Arizona, USA.
DOI 10.1108/JCRPP-02-2018-0009VOL. 4 NO. 4 2018, pp.213-225, © Emerald Publishing Limited, ISSN 2056-3841
j
JOURNAL OF CRIMINOLOGICALRESEARCH, POLICY AND PRACTICE
j
PAGE213
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