The Anger Gap
How Race Shapes Emotion in Politics

Anger can be a powerful political resource, but it mobilizes black and white Americans differentially to exacerbate political inequality.

Davin L. Phoenix (Author)

9781108485906, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 26 December 2019

300 pages, 66 b/w illus. 8 tables
23.5 x 15.7 x 2.1 cm, 0.55 kg

'... this book special and enjoyable to read.' Bethany Albertson, American Politics

Anger is a powerful mobilizing force in American politics on both sides of the political aisle, but does it motivate all groups equally? This book offers a new conceptualization of anger as a political resource that mobilizes black and white Americans differentially to exacerbate political inequality. Drawing on survey data from the last forty years, experiments, and rhetoric analysis, Phoenix finds that - from Reagan to Trump - black Americans register significantly less anger than their white counterparts and that anger (in contrast to pride) has a weaker mobilizing effect on their political participation. The book examines both the causes of this and the consequences. Pointing to black Americans' tempered expectations of politics and the stigmas associated with black anger, it shows how race and lived experience moderate the emergence of emotions and their impact on behavior. The book makes multiple theoretical contributions and offers important practical insights for political strategy.

1. Anger in black and white
2. Anger (mis)management?
3. The anger gap and turnout in American politics
4. From black anger to black activism
5. The racial enthusiasm advantage in politics
6. The anger gap, beyond black and white
7. On dreams deferred and anger inhibited.

Subject Areas: Public opinion & polls [JPVK], Political structures: democracy [JPHV], Elections & referenda [JPHF], Political science & theory [JPA], Politics & government [JP], Social, group or collective psychology [JMH], Ethnic minorities & multicultural studies [JFSL1], Ethnic studies [JFSL]