Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-mkpzs Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-27T19:07:22.507Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Beyond prejudice: Relational inequality, collective action, and social change revisited

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 November 2012

John Dixon
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, Open University, Milton Keynes MK7 6AA, United Kingdom. [email protected]://www.open.ac.uk/socialsciences/staff/people-profile.php?name=John_Dixon
Mark Levine
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, Exeter University, Exeter, Devon EX4 4SB, United Kingdom. [email protected]://psychology.exeter.ac.uk/staff/index.php?web_id=Mark_Levine
Steve Reicher
Affiliation:
School of Psychology, University of St Andrews, St Andrews, Fife KY16 9AJ, Scotland, United Kingdom. [email protected]://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/~www_sp/people/lect/sdr.shtml
Kevin Durrheim
Affiliation:
School of Psychology, University of KwaZulu-Natal, 3209, South Africa. [email protected]://psychology.ukzn.ac.za/staff.aspx

Abstract

This response clarifies, qualifies, and develops our critique of the limits of intergroup liking as a means of challenging intergroup inequality. It does not dispute that dominant groups may espouse negative attitudes towards subordinate groups. Nor does it dispute that prejudice reduction can be an effective way of tackling resulting forms of intergroup hostility. What it does dispute is the assumption that getting dominant group members and subordinate group members to like each other more is the best way of improving intergroup relations that are characterized by relatively stable, institutionally embedded, relations of inequality. In other words, the main target of our critique is the model of change that underlies prejudice reduction interventions and the mainstream concept of “prejudice” on which they are based.

Type
Authors' Response
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2012 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Allport, G. (1954) The nature of prejudice. Addison-Wesley.Google Scholar
Becker, J. C. & Wright, S. C. (2011) Yet another dark side of chivalry: Benevolent sexism undermines and hostile sexism motivates collective action for social change. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 101:6277.Google Scholar
Becker, J. C., Wright, S. C., Lubensky, M. E. & Zhou, S. (under review) Friend or ally: Whether cross-group contact undermines collective action depends what advantaged group members say (or don't say).Google Scholar
Cheung, R. M., Noel, S. & Hardin, C. D. (2011) Adopting the system-justifying attitudes of others: Effects of trivial interpersonal connections in the context of social inclusion and exclusion. Social Cognition 29:255–69.Google Scholar
Drury, J. & Reicher, S. (2009) Collective psychological empowerment as a model of social change: Researching crowds and power. Journal of Social Issues 65: 707–25. DOI: 10.1111/j.1540-4560.2009.01622.x.Google Scholar
Glick, P. & Fiske, S. T. (2001) An ambivalent alliance: Hostile and benevolent sexism as complementary justifications for gender inequality. American Psychologist 56:109–18.Google Scholar
Godbole, M. (2006) The holocaust of Indian partition: An inquest. Rupa & Co.Google Scholar
Hobsbawm, E. (1998) On history. Abacus.Google Scholar
Hodson, G. (2011) Do ideologically intolerant people benefit from intergroup contact? Current Directions in Psychological Science 20:154–59.Google Scholar
Jackman, M. R. (1994) The velvet glove: Paternalism and conflict in gender, class, and race relations. University of California Press.Google Scholar
Leach, C. (2005) Against the notion of a “new racism.” Journal of Community and Applied Social Psychology 15:432–45.Google Scholar
Mackie, D. M., Smith, E. R. & Ray, D. G. (2008) Intergroup emotions and intergroup relations. Personality and Social Psychology Compass 2:1866–80.Google Scholar
Maoz, I. (2011) Does contact work in protracted asymmetrical conflict? Appraising 20 years of reconciliation-aimed encounters between Israeli Jews and Palestinians. Journal of Peace Research 48(1):115–25.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ridgeway, C. (2001) The emergence of status beliefs: From structural inequality to legitimizing ideology. In: The psychology of legitimacy: Emerging perspectives on ideology, justice, and intergroup relations, ed. Jost, J. & Major, B., pp. 257–77. Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Saguy, T. & Chernyak-Hai, L. (2012) Intergroup contact can undermine disadvantaged group members' attributions to discrimination. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology 48:714–20.Google Scholar
Sengupta, N. K., Barlow, F. K. & Sibley, C. G. (2012) Intergroup contact and post-colonial ideology: Outgroup contact ameliorates symbolic exclusion but not historical negation. International Journal of Intercultural Relations 36:506–17.Google Scholar
Tajfel, H. & Turner, J. C. (1979) An integrative theory of intergroup conflict. In: The social psychology of intergroup relations, ed. Austin, W. G. & Worchel, S., pp. 3347. Brooks/Cole.Google Scholar
Uchida, A. (1992) When difference is dominance: A critique of the anti-power-based cultural approach to gender differences. Language in Society 21:547–68.Google Scholar
Waldzus, S. & Fiske, A. P. (in preparation) Social identities beyond comparisons: A relational models approach to intergroup relations.Google Scholar
Wright, S. C. & Lubensky, M. (2009) The struggle for social equality: Collective action vs. prejudice reduction. In: Intergroup misunderstandings: Impact of divergent social realities, ed. Demoulin, S., Leyens, J. P. & Dovidio, J. F., pp. 291310. Psychology Press.Google Scholar