Title

Sociopolitical Integration as a Mode of Progressive Race, Gender and Class in United States

Document Type

Journal Article

Publication Title

Race, Gender & Class

Publication Date

2011

Date Added

2022-05-23

Abstract

This paper reassesses the tension between minority sociopolitical integration and differences in sociopolitical trust within the framework of conflict theory. Conflict theory posits that in the United States system of government, political systems are used by elites to solidify and/or maintain their relative social advantages over the less fortunate. Minority groups have been shut-out of the sociopolitical nexus until fairly recently, and available evidence of the long-term effects of the sociopolitical integration suggests that continuation of sociopolitical trust may reduce the socio-political gap between minority and majority population. Yet even conflict theory predicts that minority sociopolitical upliftment, and corresponding occupational gains, are threats to the status quo and therefore, be opposed by those who are threatened by such gains. Similarly, shifting and multilayered levels of what is sociopolitical integration and what is sociopolitical trust in a particular context are addressed in the explication of this work.

Keywords

Civil Rights

Disciplines

Sociology

Publisher

JSTOR

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