The Diffusion of State Racial Profiling Laws

• In Event: Roundtable: Race, Ethnicity and Crime

Abstract

Estimates from national surveys conducted in the early 2000s revealed that approximately 32 million Americans reported being victims of racial profiling on at least one occasion. Recent media coverage of police killings of minority men has continued to increase public debate about profiling by law enforcement. Much of the extant racial profiling literature looks for evidence of profiling in police traffic stop data, assesses citizen attitudes about racially biased policing, or highlights the negative consequences of profiling. Noticeably absent from the literature, however, are state legislative efforts to combat racial profiling. To date, approximately 30 U.S. states have passed at least one law pertaining to racial profiling. Statutes come in a variety of forms, including explicitly banning profiling, mandating data collection on stops and searches, and creating commissions to review complaints of profiling. This study draws on the public policy diffusion literature to examine state level factors associated with the adoption of racial profiling statutes.

Author

• Dean Weld, University at Albany, SUNY