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The Political Effects of Affirmative Action: Evidence from Court Mandates to Law Enforcement Agencies

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Abstract

Affirmative action programs in public sector agencies are a canonical example of race-conscious remedial policy. While these regimes increase public sector diversity, they may also generate political backlash. In particular, they are thought to have increased support for the Republican Party in the 1970s and 1980s. Yet, there has been relatively little quantitative study of potential political backlash to the implementation of race-conscious affirmative action policies. Exploiting the onset of court-mandated affirmative action plans in US law enforcement agencies, difference-in-differences analyses suggest a positive effect of affirmative action on Democratic vote shares. These partisan effects are not driven by increased overall turnout. Although the potential for endogeneity merits caution in interpretation, the results complicate some conventional narratives about the political consequences of race-conscious social policy.

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