Police Violence and White Supremacist Terrorism

Abstract Chapter 4 takes up the issue of white supremacist terrorism in America. While much scholarship on this issue focuses on the (very real) threat posed by nonstate white supremacist terrorism, this chapter reveals the complex and longstanding relationship between state and nonstate white supremacist terrorism. The complexity of this relationship makes it difficult to draw a neat distinction between state and nonstate forms of white supremacist terrorism in past eras and today. For example, while it is rare today for serving law enforcement officers to openly endorse or be involved in acts of white supremacist terrorism, I show that contemporary practices of law enforcement that disproportionately affect Black Americans can nonetheless reflect and reinforce deeply embedded white supremacist assumptions and attitudes that can be traced to Jim Crow and before, regardless of the beliefs or intentions of law enforcement officers.