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Race, Policing, and the Limits of Social Science - Boston Review

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Democracy depends on the free exchange of ideas. Help sustain it with a tax-deductible donation today. Image: Derek Simeone / Flickr Studying the social world requires more than deference to data—no matter the prestige or sophistication of the tools with which they are parsed. Lily Hu In 2016 economist Roland G. Fryer, Jr., the youngest African American ever to be awarded tenure at Harvard, came upon what he would call the “most surprising result of my career.” In a study of racial differences in the use of force by police officers, Fryer found that Black and Hispanic civilians were no more likely than white civilians to be shot to death by police. “You know, protesting is not my thing,” Fryer told the New York Times. “But data is my thing. So I decided that I was going to collect a bunch of data and try to understand what really is going on when it comes to racial differences in police use of force.” Three thousand hours later, after meticulous records collection and analysis, the dat

May 6, 2021 In 2016 economist Roland G. Fryer, Jr., the youngest African American ever to be awarded tenure at Harvard, came upon what he would call the “most surprising result of my career.” In a study of racial differences in the use of force by police officers, Fryer found that Black and Hispanic civilians were no more likely than white civilians to be shot to death by police. “You know, protesting is not my thing,” Fryer told the New York Times. “But data is my thing. So I decided that I was going to collect a bunch of data and try to understand what really is going on when it comes to rac

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