Voting Preferences and Perceived Juvenile Crime Trends: Examining Racial and Political Differences

• DOI: 10.1177/0887403417729879
• Published date: 01 July 2019
• Date: 01 July 2019
• Subject Matter: Articles

https://doi.org/10.1177/0887403417729879

Criminal Justice Policy Review

2019, Vol. 30(6) 840 –861

© The Author(s) 2017

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DOI: 10.1177/0887403417729879

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Article

Voting Preferences and

Perceived Juvenile Crime

Trends: Examining Racial

and Political Differences

Daniel P. Mears1 and Justin T. Pickett2

Abstract

This article seeks to contribute to theory and research on factors that shape

public preferences for juvenile justice policy. To this end, it tests the argument that

perceptions about juvenile crime, an instrumental concern, will influence individuals’

willingness to vote for policymakers who support transfer of youth to adult court and,

separately, for policymakers who support rehabilitation. It also tests the hypothesis

that the identified effect will be greater among Whites, political conservatives, and, in

particular, White political conservatives. The study employs multivariate regression

analyses using survey data that are unique in including information about voter

preferences. Results of the analyses suggest partial support for the hypotheses. The

findings underscore the salience of examining voter preferences, and of taking into

account the intersection of race and political orientations, in seeking to understand

public views about crime and justice policy.

Keywords

public opinion, voter preferences, juvenile justice, juvenile transfer

During the 1980s and, until recently, juvenile justice radically transformed, progress-

ing from a child-centered, rehabilitative institution to one largely focused on punish-

ment (Feld, 1999; Roberts, 2004; Schaefer & Uggen, 2016; Scott & Steinberg, 2008;

Zimring, 2005). As Barry Feld (1999) and other scholars have emphasized, the

1Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL, USA

2State University of New York at Albany, NY, USA

Corresponding Author:

Daniel P. Mears, Florida State University, College of Criminology and Criminal Justice, Eppes Hall,

112 South Copeland Street, Tallahassee, FL 32306-1273, USA.

Email: dmears@fsu.edu

729879CJPXXX10.1177/0887403417729879Criminal Justice Policy ReviewMears and Pickett

research-article2017

Mears and Pickett 841

juvenile court increasingly became “criminalized” (Butts & Mitchell, 2000; Krisberg,

2005; Monahan, Steinberg, & Piquero, 2015). The most prominent example is the

emergence of a wide range of mechanisms for transferring youth to adult court

(Bernard & Kurlychek, 2010; Fagan & Zimring, 2000; Feld, 1999; Kupchik, 2006;

Mears, 2012). Transfer policies flourished throughout the 1980s, 1990s, and up to the

present. In so doing, they, along with other sentencing policy shifts, contributed to

prominent debates about whether the juvenile court should be abolished (Church,

Roberts, & Springer, 2014; Fagan & Zimring, 2000; Liles & Moak, 2015; Rubin,

1979; Scott & Steinberg, 2008; Zimring, 2005). In the past decade, states have sought

to temper this punitive shift by emphasizing a range of policies that seek to be “smart”

on crime (see, generally, Church et al., 2014; see also Butts & Mears, 2001). Even so,

the get-tough policies of prior decades largely remain “on the books” (Loeber &

Farrington, 2012; Schaefer & Uggen, 2016).

Responding to these changes, scholars have examined public opinion about juve-

nile crime and policy, including support for transfer policies and rehabilitation. The

resulting body of work highlights that public views are more nuanced than what poli-

cymakers typically assume. For example, the public tends to support not only get-

tough responses to juvenile crime but also rehabilitative responses. Stated differently,

many members of the public simultaneously endorse punitive and rehabilitative sanc-

tions for juvenile offending (see, for example, Cullen, Fisher, & Applegate, 2000;

Mears, Pickett, & Mancini, 2015; Nagin, Piquero, Scott, & Steinberg, 2006; Roberts,

2004; Thielo, Cullen, Cohen, & Chouhy, 2016).

This work also highlights two salient divides in views about juvenile justice—race

and political ideology. Specifically, studies suggest that Whites and minorities hold

markedly different views about crime control and sentencing and that political conser-

vatives tend to support punitive crime and justice policies (Cochran & Chamlin, 2006;

Pickett & Chiricos, 2012; Roberts, 2004; Unnever & Cullen, 2010; Vogel & Vogel,

2003). These studies, which draw on racial threat theory and research on public opin-

ion about crime, suggest that Whites and conservatives are more likely to view crime

as a threat to social order, not merely as an isolated social problem, and thus as a phe-

nomenon that requires a punitive response to restore order.

Alongside of these divides is the question of whether individuals’ support for par-

ticular policies stems from an instrumental consideration—namely, their perception

that juvenile crime is increasing—and whether the effect of such a consideration is

itself influenced by these divides. That is, are the effects of an instrumental concern

with crime racially and politically patterned? More specifically, do perceptions about

crime translate into differential support among White political conservatives and

minority political conservatives for politicians who endorse particular policies? The

focus on political preferences stems from the fact that research to date has focused on

public views about particular policies, not whether their views may influence voting

preferences. Studies suggest that the “punitive turn” since the 1980s resulted from

public concern about crime (Farrall, Jackson, & Gray, 2009; Garland, 2000). However,

an important and largely unaddressed question is whether perceptions about social

problems, such as increasing crime, translate into political preferences for politicians