Did Black Lives Matter Protests Change Public Opinion?

Abstract

Protest events affect public opinion on the issue of interest. However, the extent to which an individual’s proximity to protests impacts public opinion is less examined. Does a protest event occurring nearby, i.e., within an individual’s neighborhood, impact their opinion? Do protests that happen further away, perhaps in the next county, have the same impact on public opinion? This study analyzes the impact of exposure to protests by focusing on the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement in 2020 using public opinion data from Iowa merged with protest locations in Iowa. Specifically, we examine public support for BLM and for defunding the police. We evaluate the role of distance through a discrete mileage cut-off and a distance decay function. Our analysis shows that people living closer to protests show greater support for the BLM movement in general and, to a less extent, for defunding the police. The results suggest that protests may affect public opinion, but only within a very narrow range of a few miles.

Keywords

Black Lives Matter protests public opinion spatial proximity

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Andrews

K. T.

Beyerlein

Tucker Farnum

(2016). The legitimacy of protest: Explaining white southerners’ attitudes toward the civil rights movement. Social Forces, 94(3), 1021–1044. https://doi.org/10.1093/sf/sov097

Banks

(2018). Disciplining black activism: Post-racial rhetoric, public memory and decorum in news media framing of the black lives matter movement. Continuum, 32(6), 709–720. https://doi.org/10.1080/10304312.2018.1525920

Boehmke

F. J.

Branton

R. P.

Dillingham

Witmer

R. C.

(2012). Close enough for comfort? The spatial structure of interest and information in ballot measure elections. The Journal of Politics, 74(3), 827–839. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0022381612000321

Boudet

H. S.

Zanocco

C. M.

Howe

P. D.

Clarke

C. E.

(2018). The effect of geographic proximity to unconventional oil and gas development on public support for hydraulic frac- turing. Risk Analysis: An Official Publication of the Society for Risk Analysis, 38(9), 1871–1890. https://doi.org/10.1111/risa.12989

Branton

Dillingham

Dunaway

Miller

(2007). Anglo voting on nativist ballot initiatives: The partisan impact of spatial proximity to the US-Mexico border. Social Science Quarterly, 88(3), 882–897. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-6237.2007.00488.x

Branton

R. P.

Dunaway

(2009). Spatial proximity to the us—Mexico border and newspaper coverage of immigration issues. Political Research Quarterly, 62(2), 289–302. https://doi.org/10.1177/1065912908319252

Branton

R. P.

Martinez-Ebers

Carey

T. E.

Jr Matsubayashi

(2015). Social protest and policy attitudes: The case of the 2006 immigrant rallies. American Journal of Political Science, 59(2), 390–402. https://doi.org/10.1111/ajps.12159

Bureau

U. C.

(2020). American community survey 5-year estimates. https://www.census.gov/programs-surveys/acs/data.html

Clarke

C. E.

Bugden

Hart

P. S.

Stedman

R. C.

Jacquet

J. B.

Evensen

D. T.

, et al. (2016). How geographic distance and political ideology interact to influence public perception of unconventional oil/natural gas development. Energy Policy, 97, 301–309. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enpol.2016.07.032

10.

Cobbina-Dungy

Chaudhuri

LaCourse

DeJong

(2022). “Defund the police:” perceptions among protesters in the 2020 march on Washington. Criminology & Public Policy.

11.

Cortina

(2020). From a distance: Geographic proximity, partisanship, and public attitudes toward the us–Mexico border wall. Political Research Quarterly, 73(3), 740–754. https://doi.org/10.1177/1065912919854135

12.

Costain

A. N.

Majstorovic

(1994). Congress, social movements and public opinion: Multiple origins of women’s rights legislation. Political Research Quarterly, 47(1), 111–135. https://doi.org/10.1177/106591299404700106

13.

Cottle

(2008). Reporting demonstrations: The changing media politics of dissent. Media, Culture & Society, 30(6), 853–872. https://doi.org/10.1177/0163443708096097

14.

Data

M. E.

Lab

(2018). County presidential election Returns 2000-2020. https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/VOQCHQ

15.

Drakulich

Denver

(2022). The partisans and the persuadables: Public views of black lives matter and the 2020 protests. Perspectives on Politics, 20(4), 1191–1208. https://doi.org/10.1017/s1537592721004114

16.

Drakulich

Wozniak

K. H.

Hagan

Johnson

(2021). Whose lives mattered? How white and black americans felt about black lives matter in 2016. Law & Society Review, 55(2), 227–251. https://doi.org/10.1111/lasr.12552

17.

Feinberg

Willer

Kovacheff

(2020). The activist’s dilemma: Extreme protest actions reduce popular support for social movements. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 119(5), 1086–1111. https://doi.org/10.1037/pspi0000230

18.

Glanton

(2016). Hillary clinton isn’t afraid to say black lives matter. https://www.chicagotribune.com/columns/ct-clinton-black-lives-matter-glanton-20160727-column.html

19.

Greenwald

A. G.

Banaji

M. R.

(1995). Implicit social cognition: Attitudes, self-esteem, and stereotypes. Psychological Review, 102(1), 4–27. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-295x.102.1.4

20.

Gutting

R. S.

(2020). Contentious activities, disrespectful protesters: Effect of protest context on protest support and mobilization across ideology and authoritarianism. Political Behavior, 42(3), 865–890. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11109-018-09523-8

21.

Horowitz

J. M.

Livingston

(2016). How americans view the black lives matter movement. Pew Research Center. https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2016/07/08/how-americans-view-the-black-lives-matter-movement/

22.

Huff

Kruszewska

(2016). Banners, barricades, and bombs: The tactical choices of social movements and public opinion. Comparative Political Studies, 49(13), 1774–1808. https://doi.org/10.1177/0010414015621072

23.

Jackman

(2017). Proposed laws would criminalize protest. https://www.berkshireeagle.com/archives/proposed-laws-would-criminalize-protest/article_c161e16c-c73a-5f9e-9878-338d6809b160.html

24.

Jean

(2020). Black lives matter: Police brutality in the era of covid-19. Population Health Research Brief Series, 34.

25.

Klein Teeselink

Melios

(2021). Weather to protest: The effect of black lives matter protests on the 2020 presidential election.

26.

Lowery

(2015). Elizabeth warren just gave the speech that black lives matter activists have been waiting for. WP Company. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2015/09/27/elizabeth-warren-just-gave-the-speech-that-black-lives-matter-activists-have-been-waiting-for/

27.

Mazumder

(2018). The persistent effect of us civil rights protests on political attitudes. American Journal of Political Science, 62(4), 922–935. https://doi.org/10.1111/ajps.12384

28.

Mazumder

(2019). Black lives matter for whites’ racial prejudice: Assessing the role of social movements in shaping racial attitudes in the United States.

29.

Metcalfe

Pickett

J. T.

(2022). Public fear of protesters and support for protest policing: An experimental test of two theoretical models. Criminology, 60(1), 60–89. https://doi.org/10.1111/1745-9125.12291

30.

Murdie

Purser

(2017). How protest affects opinions of peaceful demonstration and expression rights. Journal of Human Rights, 16(3), 351–369. https://doi.org/10.1080/14754835.2016.1260441

31.

Neveu

(2002). The local press and farmers’ protests in brittany: Proximity and distance in the local newspaper coverage of a social movement. Journalism Studies, 3(1), 53–67. https://doi.org/10.1080/14616700120107338

32.

Orazani

S. N.

Leidner

(2019). The power of nonviolence: Confirming and explaining the success of nonviolent (rather than violent) political movements. European Journal of Social Psychology, 49(4), 688–704. https://doi.org/10.1002/ejsp.2526

33.

Orsini

Smith

(2010). Social movements, knowledge and public policy: The case of autism activism in Canada and the us. Critical Policy Studies, 4(1), 38–57. https://doi.org/10.1080/19460171003714989

34.

Pulido

Demeritt Pulido

Meernik (2019). Violence, voting & peace: Explaining public support for the peace referendum in Colombia. Electoral Studies, 61, 102067. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.electstud.2019.102067

35.

Raleigh

Linke

Hegre

Karlsen

(2010). Introducing ACLED: An armed conflict location and event dataset. Journal of Peace Research, 47(5), 651–660. https://doi.org/10.1177/0022343310378914

36.

Russett

Nincic

(1976). American opinion on the use of military force abroad. Political Science Quarterly, 91(3), 411–431. https://doi.org/10.2307/2148934

37.

Shah

Widjaya

(2020). Posts mentioning ’black lives matter’ spiked on lawmakers’ social media accounts after george floyd killing. Pew Research Center. https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2020/07/16/posts-mentioning-black-lives-matter-spiked-on-lawmakers-social-media-accounts-after-george-floyd-killing/

38.

Simpson

Willer

Feinberg

(2018). Does violent protest backfire? Testing a theory of public reactions to activist violence. Socius: Sociological Research for a Dynamic World, 4, 237802311880318. https://doi.org/10.1177/2378023118803189

39.

Statista

R. D.

(2022). People shot to death by u.s. police, by race 2022. https://www.statista.com/statistics/585152/people-shot-to-death-by-us-police-by-race/

40.

Stephan

M. J.

Chenoweth

(2008). Why civil resistance works: The strategic logic of nonviolent conflict. International Security, 33(1), 7–44. https://doi.org/10.1162/isec.2008.33.1.7

41.

Tobler

W. R.

(1970). A computer movie simulating urban growth in the detroit region. Economic Geography, 46(sup1), 234–240. https://doi.org/10.2307/143141

42.

Traag

V. A.

Quax

Sloot

P. M.

(2017). Modelling the distance impedance of protest attendance. Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and Its Applications, 468, 171–182. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.physa.2016.10.054

43.

Updegrove

A. H.

Cooper

M. N.

Orrick

E. A.

Piquero

A. R.

(2020). Red states and black lives: Applying the racial threat hypothesis to the black lives matter movement. Justice Quarterly, 37(1), 85–108. https://doi.org/10.1080/07418825.2018.1516797

44.

Wasow

(2020). Agenda seeding: How 1960s black protests moved elites, public opinion and voting. American Political Science Review, 114(3), 638–659. https://doi.org/10.1017/s000305542000009x

45.

Weaver

V. M.

(2007). Frontlash: Race and the development of punitive crime policy. Studies in American Political Development, 21(2), 230–265. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0898588x07000211

46.

Weigel

(2016). Three words that republicans wrestle with: ‘black lives matter’. WP Company. https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/three-words-that-republicans-wrestle-with-black-lives-matter/2016/07/12/f5a9dfdc-4878-11e6-90a8-fb84201e0645story.html