Prejudice propagates when privileged groups stand to gain from exploiting minorities

Evidence

Although Allport did not articulate the instrumental nature of such prejudice in detail, he did acknowledge that prejudice can serve many functions for dominant groups, such as maintaining economic and political dominance, social status, and sexual access. Moreover, Allport gave some credit to the Marxist notion that because systems involving social stratification tend to be exploitative, members of dominant groups may be motivated, consciously or unconsciously, to maintain their advantage by promoting myths about disadvantaged groups that imply that the exploitation is in fact fair, deserved, and necessary. He concluded that “there lies at the heart of any diversified and stratified social system the tempting possibility that economic, sexual, political, and status gains may result from a deliberative (and even from unconscious) exploitation of minorities. To achieve those gains, prejudice is propagated by those who stand to win the most advantage” (Allport, 1954/1979, p. 234). — John F. Dovidio, Peter Glick, Laurie A. Rudman, On the Nature of Prejudice, 1480

Categorization

• DEEPTHINKING: Allport’s concession to the Marxist account — that prejudice is instrumentally propagated by beneficiaries — is a dense, paradigm-shifting proto-theory of motivated belief that anticipates later system-justification research.
• XREF: Directly anticipates Jost & Hamilton’s system justification theory (chapter 13 in this same volume) and connects to the reader’s material on sacrifice-as-stabilizer of stratified societies. — connects to: When two human groups compete, the advantaged one maintains dominance through oppression — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 151; Ethnic frictions and status rivalries shape prejudice more than ideology does — John Higham, Strangers in the Land: Patterns of…, 2016; Collective guilt is contested through ideological debate between privileged and disadvantaged groups. — Nyla R. Branscombe and Bertjan Doosje (eds.), Collective Guilt: International…, 592 (+3 more)
• corroborated: 3 independent passages support this claim — John F. Dovidio, Peter Glick, Laurie A. Rudman, On the Nature of Prejudice: Fifty Years…, 1480