Persistent inequality breeds new ideologies defending privileged positions across eras

Evidence

Insofar as important inequalities remain, it should be expected that new attitudes and beliefs, amenable to the current context, will begin to arise to explain and defend those inequalities. These new attitudes and beliefs emerge naturally from one group’s “side” of social experience as they attempt to provide meaning and order in their lives. The bent of these emerging views will be such as to support a privileged group’s hegemonic position. A key psychological basis for this tendency is the sense of group position. It has been suggested that the most persuasive argument for resistance to large-scale racial change in the present social context is an appeal to the value of individualism (Jackman & Muha, 1984). Policies that are premised on the recognition of group characteristics are resisted, ostensibly, because they violate the ideal of individualism. — John T. Jost and Jim Sidanius, Political Psychology, 3421 (#exemplifies, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Bedjaoui proposed corrective inequality to redress postcolonial exploitation. — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market: Human Rights…, 418; Anticipated status loss decades away still shifts politics right — Maureen A. Craig and Jennifer A. Richeson, On the Precipice of a…, 89; Narrated exclusivity hardens over time into constitutive claims of positional superiority. — Nadim N. Rouhana and Nadera Shalhoub-Kevorkian, When Politics Are Sacralized:…, 114 (+12 more)

Broader Connections

• Racial inequality persists in new symbolic forms that defend privileged group positions #exemplifies (0.92) — John T. Jost and Jim Sidanius, Political Psychology, 3421