Ethical use of administrative data in inequality research

Abstract

The growth of machine learning techniques and massive administrative data sets has dovetailed with increasing interest in racial inequality in political science. While this has invigorated research on race and politics, scholarly investments in Big Data have proceeded without sufficient attention to ethical considerations governing the use of publicly available, but sensitive, information. This paper closes this gap by providing empirical evidence on perceptions of ethics regarding data use by participants themselves. In two large-sample survey experiments, we examine how members of the public perceive research ethics in studies of racial and ethnic politics that leverage public and administrative records, and provide practical recommendations for scholars using these data sets in their research. By highlighting this growing gap, we hope to spark conversation regarding ethics as the academic community confronts these dramatic advances in data collection and statistical analysis.