The definitional and methodological challenges of studying hate crimes: evaluating official statistics, victimization, and self-report data

Joseph H. Michalski

Chapter 2 in Research Handbook on Hate and Hate Crimes in Society, 2024, pp 15-35 from Edward Elgar Publishing

Abstract: The chapter first outlines the definitional issues, both academic and governmental, associated with documenting and studying hate crimes mainly in the United States and Canada. The relative lack of consistency presents the first hurdle that must be overcome to evaluate more reliably the scope, incidence, and prevalence of hate crimes in both countries. Following the conceptual discussion, the chapter focuses on the methodological issues involved in documenting hate crimes using official statistics as compared with evidence from both victimization and self-report studies. The differences in these main sources of data are shown to reflect fundamentally different types of human social behavior with different social determinants. The chapter concludes with a series of recommendations with respect to future directions in hate crime research.

Keywords: Law - Academic; Sociology and Social Policy; Sustainable Development Goals (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
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