At Slate, James Verini examines “The Obama Effect,” a theory gaining traction which states that dwindling violent-crime rates in predominantly African-American neighborhoods in the past three years, even during this bruising recession, is the result of a more positive outlook among blacks since the election of the first African-American President. An excerpt:
“One unlikely explanation that is gaining credence among experts, including some of the biggest names in the field, is a phenomenon tentatively dubbed ‘the Obama Effect.’ Simply put, it holds that the election of the first black president has provided such collective inspiration that it has changed the thinking or behavior of would-be or one-time criminals. The effect is not yet quantifiable, but some very numbers-driven researchers believe it may exist.
Rick Rosenfeld, the president of the American Society of Criminology, studies the relationship between consumer sentiment and crime rates, which appear to track closely. Despite the recession, Rosenfeld has found, black Americans are remarkably confident about their economic futures. In 2009, despite being in the midst of the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression, 39 percent of black people surveyed said they were better off than they’d been five years before, as opposed to just 20 percent who answered that question in the affirmative in 2007. In the same survey, there was a 14 percent increase among blacks who said they thought the standard of living gap between themselves and whites was diminishing, and a 9 percent increase in blacks who believed that the future for black people will be better.
‘I think there’s little question the election had the effect of improving the general outlook of blacks and especially their economic outlook,’ Rosenfeld told me. ‘Normally, blacks tend to be more pessimistic about economic prospects, even in good economic times.'”
Tags: Barack Obama, James Verini, Rick Rosenfeld