Measuring Racial Discrimination (2004) / Chapter Skim
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9 An Illustration of Methodological Complexity: Racial Profiling
9 An Illustration of Methodological Complexity: Racial Profiling
Pages 186-202
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From page 186... ...
We begin with definitions of profiling and racial profiling. Profiling is a statistically discriminatory screening process in which some individuals in a population (e.g., automobile drivers, income tax filers, people going through customs, people boarding an airplane)
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From page 187... ...
; it is simply one instance of the more general phenomenon we have termed statistical discrimination. Racial profiling in the criminal justice arena entails the use by law enforcement personnel of statistical generalizations about a group of people based on their race.
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From page 188... ...
The measurement and modeling issues are similar to those discussed in Chapter 7 on using statistical models with observational data to measure discrimination by inference, but some special issues in the profiling situation warrant attention. We also briefly discuss racial or ethnic profiling as a policy option in the context of the increased threats to public security from terrorist attacks.
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From page 189... ...
Of course, time has passed since we began our deliberations, and public officials, as well as the nation as a whole, have continued to discuss and debate the pros and cons of profiling in the terrorism context. We have not been connected to those debates and do not comment on specific rulings or positions that have been proposed or adopted in the interim (e.g., the Bush administration policy guidance that permits ethnic profiling in narrow circumstances involving international terrorism)
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From page 190... ...
On the other hand, police officers who make appropriate stops may in some cases face unwarranted charges of racial profiling if their stop rates by race are compared with population (baseline) rates that are poorly measured (see below)
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From page 191... ...
report on five different approaches used by researchers to gather baseline data for determining racially disparate outcomes for traffic stops: census data, observations of roadway usage, assessments of traffic-violating behavior, citizen surveys, and internal departmental comparisons. They review various studies that use these strategies to construct baseline measures for traffic stops and describe the strengths and limitations of each.
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From page 192... ...
Lamberth (1996) reports on a study in which observers driving at the posted speed limit categorized the racial composition of about 5,700 drivers traveling over the speed limit (violators)
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From page 193... ...
(Specifically, 7.9 percent of the white drivers observed in Lamberth's study, but only 3.6 percent of the black drivers, were not speeding.) Indeed, a subsequent study conducted on the New Jersey turnpike using radar devices and cameras to determine car speeds and the race of drivers revealed that blacks did drive at very high speeds more often than whites, which would likely cause them to attract more attention from police.6 Yet even if racial differences in the rate of stopping motorists on Maryland highways can be explained by differences in driving behavior, the racial disparities in rates of search for illegal activity conditional on being stopped appear to be quite large.
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From page 194... ...
They suggest the best strategy is to use multiple baseline measures to make comparisons with official police data. To best estimate a baseline population, they suggest using surveys and observational studies conducted in various loca 7It may be that data from jurisdictions that have installed cameras at intersections that automatically take pictures of certain kinds of violations will be helpful in this regard.
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From page 195... ...
Seven of 13 studies of traffic stops conducted between 1996 and 2001 (reviewed in Engel et al., 2002) concluded that racial discrimination by police officers fully explained the observed racial differences in stops (American Civil Liberties Union, 2000; Harris, 1999b; Lamberth, 1996; State of New Jersey v.
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From page 196... ...
PROFILING IN THE CONTEXT OF TERRORISM Because of renewed interest in the United States in the possible use of profiling to identify and apprehend potential terrorists before they commit violent acts, we briefly examine the challenges of identifying screening factors that could potentially select would-be terrorists with a significantly higher probability than purely random selection. Following the attacks of September 11, 2001, media commentators discussed the possibility of racial or ethnic profiling for selecting airplane flight passengers for additional investigation; some also questioned the value of purely random screening, which results in picking up individuals likely to be harmless (e.g., elderly women)
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From page 197... ...
Hence, although the free speech analogy does suggest that civil liberties are not absolute and have been limited for the public good, it also suggests that their limitation usually imposes constraints that are universally shared. By definition, profiling, to be effective, cannot impose widely shared constraints.
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From page 198... ...
In the case of airline security, this evaluation is made most difficult because terrorist incidents in the United States are very rare events, and the estimated numbers of known terrorists and their associates are very small compared with more than 2 million air passengers and the number of innocent people who are profiled on any given day. Even though all 19 of the September 11 attackers were young Middle Eastern men, it is difficult to draw reliable conclusions from this fact regarding the propensity of any other young Middle Eastern men, let alone anyone else, to engage in future terrorist acts, given the many other factors involved and the rarity of terrorist actions.
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From page 199... ...
for additional investigation, it could enlist a person without those characteris 12 For estimating hit rates in this situation, the higher stop and search rates for blacks simply provide a larger sample for that group. 13 If an experiment could be conducted in which people were stopped and searched at random in the same areas in which security personnel initiate stops, it might be possible to examine this issue.
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From page 200... ...
Costs and Benefits of Profiling The benefits of an effective profiling model are readily stated in general terms. In the terrorism context, they include the possible prevention of terrorist acts that, if not detected, could result in catastrophic loss of lives and property.
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From page 201... ...
Trade-offs Analysts might consider developing formal cost-effectiveness models to compare the benefits and costs that could be expected from the use of racial or ethnic profiling as a tool in such situations as screening flight passengers to help identify terrorists. Such a task would be challenging in the extreme, although attempts to develop such models could help illuminate the difficult trade-offs involved in assessing the value of profiling.
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From page 202... ...
profiling is likely to be only marginally effective in detecting terrorists in airports and similar venues and, at the same time, will subject many innocent people to harassment and stigmatization; and the importance our society places on protecting core societal values of equal protection and liberties for all. Over time our society has progressed, through civil war, constitutional amendments, legislation, and court cases, to a conclusion that race-based discrimination in such domains as job markets, housing, and voting is unacceptable and should not be allowed, despite arguments that might be offered to the contrary (e.g., allegations that the presence of disadvantaged racial groups lowers property values)
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