Exam 18: Annabelle Lever and Allan Hillman, “Racial Profiling”

Summarize Annabelle Lever's understanding of how racial profiling affects police officers' prejudices. Do a little research on the formation of prejudices. Explain what you found. Then consider: does this research support or fail to support Lever's claims?

In his essay, Hillman identifies the controversial type of profiling. What is it?

In her reply, Lever argues that once one recognizes the extent of _____ in our societies, it seems clear that combining racial profiling with affirmative action is wholly inadequate?

In her essay, Lever offers two examples of crime preventing tactics that serve as viable alternatives to racial profiling. What are they?

In her essay, Lever discusses three objections to racial profiling. Which of the following is NOT one of those objections?

In his essay, Hillman explains that institutional entities may use the type of rationality that an agent uses who wishes to achieve the most efficient or cost-effective means in order to achieve some end. What is this type of rationality called?

In his essay, Hillman affirms that if racial profiling can be reasonably suggested to result in harms, those harms will be in some way _____ in nature?

In her reply, Annabelle Lever discusses the relationship between certain policies and increased crime rates. She says that …policies that may appear on their face to have nothing to do with the racial characteristics of crime - such as urban renewal or government support for home ownership - turn out to explain why some social groups, rather than others, face crime and violence as an everyday part of their lives, and may find themselves tempted to engage in it as a rational strategy for improving their lot in life, or drawn into it through friendship, loneliness, anger, depression, despair. In your essay, explain what Lever means here. Why might someone think that all this is irrelevant to the ethics of criminal profiling? What argument could they give to this effect? And how might Lever respond?

In her essay, Lever argues that who will be the main beneficiaries of the racial profiling of black people?

Through Lever's essay and Hillman's reply, it becomes clear that the authors agree that "racial profiling is little more than a self-fulfilling prophecy."

In his reply, Hillman affirms that one of Lever's objections assumes what without argument?

In his essay, Allan Hillman compares the act of racial profiling to the types of considerations that other medical professionals make: "Like the physician, the police officer is simply taking into consideration the prior probabilities of group behavior in order to better do her job." In your essay, evaluate the aptness of this parallel. In other words, does Hillman's move work? Can you think of a morally relevant factor that distinguishes the doctor's case from the police officer's? Defend your answer.

Identify the author who states the following in their reply: "the police, like racialised minorities, have collective as well as individual interests in protection from arbitrary and prejudiced judgements about their sentiments, beliefs and behaviour."