Citation

Flores RD. Soc. Probl. 2015; 62(3): 363-390.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2015, Society for the Study of Social Problems, Publisher Oxford University Press)

DOI

10.1093/socpro/spv012

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

In recent years, more than 24 Pennsylvania communities have proposed restrictionist immigration ordinances. These policies include fines for employers and landlords of undocumented immigrants, and English-only declarations. Using fixed effects regression, I find that the proposal of these policies was associated with a 6 percent increase in handgun sales in the Pennsylvania counties in which these ordinances were formally considered. I use ethnographic and newspaper data from Pennsylvania to uncover the mechanisms that link these laws with increased gun purchases. I find that as public leaders made the case for these policies, they increasingly linked immigrants with crime and social disorder. These menacing portrayals of immigrants intensified social anxiety, which led to an increase in gun purchases. These results are replicated using concealed gun permits data from South Carolina. This article contributes to the symbolic politics literature by showing the social consequences of politicians' use of threatening symbols to portray immigrants, as well as to the gun-ownership literature by providing evidence for the role of social and political factors in influencing gun acquisition. The proliferation of gun ownership could have worrisome public health consequences in communities experiencing rapid demographic changes.

Language: en