In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

chapter 12 Racial/Ethnic Diversity and States’ Public Policies Social Policies as Context for Welfare Policies rodney e. hero The federal structure of the U.S. governmental system is important in numerous and varied ways. One major implication is that state governments are signi‹cant policymakers in the United States. Historically , the states have been the primary domestic public policymakers and, despite tremendous changes over time, they remain so (Elazar 1966). By many accounts the importance of state government has grown over the last generation in several policy areas. Therefore, social policy in the United States cannot be understood without considering the implications of the federal system of policy authority as a major institutional feature. By extension, a central question is how to best understand states’ policy orientations. Welfare policy, while of substantial importance and probably the most studied, is but one of several major policy responsibilities of state governments in the United States. The “police power” of the states—that they may legislate regarding the “health, safety, morals, and well-being” of their citizens—provides signi‹cant authority and substantial discretion in addressing a host of policy concerns. The policy responsibility of states also permits varied policy responses and outcomes. States have shared the responsibility for formulating and administering welfare policy, thus 298 ⠂ assuring important in›uence. States share responsibility with the national government, itself a “federal” entity in that state and substate constituencies are woven into the national government’s structure, adding to the states’ considerable in›uence. At the same time, states clearly have primary legal authority and responsibility for human capital policies, such as education, and for social regulation, such as criminal justice, and others that tend to be intertwined with and have implications for “welfare ” needs and policies. For example, education, criminal justice, and welfare policies can, in part, be thought of as causes and/or consequences of each other. Moreover, if welfare policy may be thought of as “regulating the poor” and minorities (cf. Piven and Cloward 1971), public policies such as education, criminal justice, and other policies might also be viewed in this light because they may constrain, or enable, individual and group conditions. In shaping social and economic opportunity, generally through a variety of curricular and pedagogical decisions and through the regulation of behavior through student suspension and other practices , education affects the social standing, income, and broader wellbeing of individuals. State education and criminal justice policies and outcomes thus provide a backdrop for, and a window onto, welfare policy (cf. Fording 2001). The importance of federalism, and state policy authority speci‹cally, is heightened by another reality of U.S. political and social history. Race/ethnicity is and has been a pervasive in›uence in the political and social system, as numerous scholars and observers have argued (Key 1949; Hero 1998; Smith 1993; Carmines and Stimson 1989). Particularly important here, the various racial/ethnic groups are not distributed equally across the states, as detailed below. This has affected politics and policy in the United States, including—and perhaps especially—state policies (Key 1949; Burnham 1974). “Welfare reform” legislation should be considered within this broader institutional and policy context, and with due attention to such factors as race/ethnicity that are part of the American social, economic, and political fabric. This chapter contends that states’ “social diversity” is a major factor in understanding their public policy. That is, the varied racial/ethnic composition and con‹gurations have a major impact on state policies—even after considering the impact of socioeconomic factors such as states’ level of income, education, and urbanization. The effects of social diversity on state policies are shown to be substantial and evident in some form in all states; race thus very much remains an American dilemma. The manifestations are different; that is, they have differracial /ethnic diversity and states’ public policies 299 ent forms or “faces” in different social context(s). This needs to be fully appreciated and systematically incorporated into theory and research on state social and human policy. If there is evidence of racial factors affecting these various policy areas—as is indicated below—then the connection to and impact of race on welfare policies becomes clearer and more readily understood. In the mid-1900s, V. O. Key (1949) demonstrated that race was the central characteristic of politics in the southern states, and the signi‹cance of racial/ethnic diversity for state politics has been suggested in numerous other works (e.g., Hill 1994; Lieske 1993). Despite...

Share