Segregation, Education and the Politics of State Takeover

AJ Rice, University of California, Santa Barbara

State takeovers of public-school districts rank among the most controversial school reform policies of the past half century. Since the first district takeover in 1989, dozens of states have passed laws authorizing the restructuring of local school governments. These policies have impacted the lives of millions of families across hundreds of American cities. Advocates of takeovers acknowledge that state intervention is an extreme form of restructuring but point to school districts with dismal educational performance and deteriorating financial conditions as evidence that local institutions have failed and require such extraordinary external measures. Critics of these reforms, however, argue their disproportionate impact on African Americans is not by chance. Researchers have found a strong relationship between high African American school enrollment and incidents of state takeovers. Recently, one study concluded that districts with majority-African American enrollment are more likely to experience state takeovers and have their elected officials removed from office than any other racial group (Morel 2018). Yet, despite important findings about the association between race and state takeover policies, we know little about the mechanisms through which race shapes the development of takeover policies. How, and to what extent, does race shape the development of state takeover policies in the US? Using Michigan as a case study and the method of process tracing, this paper draws on original archival research, public records, secondary sources, and interview data to examine the development of education policy in Michigan from the 1974 Milliken v. Bradley Supreme Court decision through the 2016 creation of the Detroit Public Schools Community District. Building on Paul Pierson’s (2000) concept of path dependency, I argue that racial segregation is a social process exhibiting increasing returns primarily to white Americans. Thus, institutional incentives exist for policymakers to implement legislation like takeovers that maintain rather than ameliorate racial inequality.

No extended abstract or paper available

 Presented in Session 192. Ethnoracial Stratification as Privilege