State Repression and Ethnoracial Classification: Evidence from Japanese American Internment

• In Event: Asia and Asian American Section Open Call Paper Session

Abstract

We study how state action reshapes ethnoracial boundaries by examining Japanese internment and subsequent racial classification. Using linked Full-Count 1940–1950 census records (N=73k), we follow individuals exposed to internment based on pre-war residence in exclusion-zone states and compare them with individuals of Japanese ancestry living in other mainland states. Our primary outcome is the difference in the 1950 census race classification relative to 1940. We use a difference-in-differences design to estimate the effect of internment on shifts away from “Japanese” race classification and a triple-differences design that contrasts the Japanese with an analogous Chinese comparison group. Across multiple definitions of identity (enumerator-based race, ancestry, and nativity), we find that exposure to internment predicts a substantial decline in the retention of Japanese classification between 1940 and 1950. The results highlight the administrative production of race and show how coercive state policies alter the boundaries of ethnoracial categories in official statistics.

Authors

• Thelonious Goerz, Cornell University

• Jiwon Lee, Cornell University