Hatred and Profits: Under the Hood of the Ku Klux Klan*

Abstract

In this article, we analyze the 1920s Ku Klux Klan, those who joined it, and its social and political impact by combining a wide range of archival data sources with data from the 1920 and 1930 U.S censuses. We find that individuals who joined the Klan in some cities were more educated and more likely to hold professional jobs than the typical American. Surprisingly, we find little evidence that the Klan had an effect on black or foreign-born residential mobility or vote totals. Rather than a terrorist organization, the 1920s Klan is best described as social organization with a very successful multilevel marketing structure fueled by an army of highly incentivized sales agents selling hatred, religious intolerance, and fraternity in a time and place where there was tremendous demand.

The more, the merrier? Women in top‐management teams and entrepreneurship in established firms

“…This “approach is appropriate when existing theory provides a useful frame for a baseline argument but is not robust enough for precise hypotheses” (Bettis et al , : 950). Although inductive large‐N research designs are rare in the management literature (but see Amore, Garofalo, and Minichilli, ; Birhanu, Gambardella, and Valentini, ), they have often been applied in economic and finance research (e.g., Bandiera, Prat, and Sadun, ; Fryer and Levitt, ; Jensen and Murphy, ).…”

The Internet and Hate Crime: Offline Spillovers from Online Access

“…More specifically within this stream, we add to a literature on hate crime. Extant research in this area has studied the prevailing trends of hate activity with respect to changing socioeconomic conditions (Beck and Tolnay 1990) and political economy (Glaeser 2005, Fryer andLevitt 2012), its relation to geographical considerations (Krueger and Pischke 1996) and law enforcement policies (Gan et al 2011). By empirically demonstrating the role of improved connectivity via Internet availability on racial hate crime, our work sheds light on the theoretically ambiguous relationship between communication technology and hatred (Glaeser 2005).…”

Collective Action, White Flight, and the Origins of Formal Segregation Laws

“…Second, white population pressures might well have reduced the ability to organize political pressure groups, but as long as the costs of organizing politically were less affected by population growth than the costs of organizing private vigilante groups the results above would be sensible. Along the same lines, to be effective private action required sustained and repeated efforts, but white vigilante activity often dissipated quickly-even the Klan, probably the best organized and persistent white racist vigilante group saw waves of participation and inaction (Fryer and Levitt 2012). By contrast, once it was passed, a segregation law was durable and required little in the way of repeat organizational activity to sustain it.…”