Louise Seamster
Biographic Data
| ID | 159497 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Louise Seamster |
| GIVEN NAMES | Louise |
| FAMILY NAME | Seamster |
| SIGNATURE | SEAMSTER L |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Iowa |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-5462-2292 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 18 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 354 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 18 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2015 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 10 |
Mechanisms, smoke and fun-house mirrors: When Naming Racism Is Not Enough
Socioenvironmental Injustice across the Global Divide
This paper explores the connections between two seemingly disparate cases of socioenvironmental injustice: Flint’s water crisis in Michigan, USA, and Union Carbide’s toxic chemical release in Bhopal, India. Engaging our empirical and theoretical insights from these two cases, this paper illustrates how marginalized people in distant settings can face similar socioenvironmental struggles. Considering Bhopal and Flint as instances of slow violence …
A Pathway to Racial Equity: Student Debt Cancellation Policy Designs
Student debt in the United States has had a disproportionate negative impact on black and Latinx borrowers. We argue that analyses of plans proposing student debt cancellation should therefore foreground their potential impact on racial equity. To do so, we use data from the 2019 Survey of Consumer Finances and model the impact of debt cancellation on four key policy outcomes (reach, impact on the most vulnerable borrowers, borrower wealth gains,…
Power, Participation, and Protest in Flint, Michigan: Unpacking the Policy Paradox of Municipal Takeovers
Creative extraction: Black towns in white space
This article interrogates the "anomalous" case of Black-founded towns, so-called because of their relative absence from discourse on Black place, their unique struggles for self-determined development, and their externally ascribed narratives of absent or dysfunctional governance, frequently invoked to explain their lack of access to basic infrastructure. We propose illuminating some of these so-called anomalies through Charles Mills' "racial con…
Critical Race Theory and Empirical Sociology
We argue that empirical sociology would benefit from a greater engagement with critical race theory (CRT). In this introduction, we outline four steps to the empirical application of CRT in sociology: (1) understanding that social science is not value neutral, (2) using CRT to inform research design and methodology, (3) investigating racism at multiple levels of analysis, and (4) empirical data and analysis should uncover the relational aspect to…
Racialized Debts: Racial Exclusion From Credit Tools and Information Networks
Research on debt highlights its use as a tool for investment and a substitute for public welfare programs. Use of debt, however, is not equal across social groups. Black households in particular have lower debt levels than white households. In this paper, we explore the context behind massive racial disparities in household debt. Conceptually, we propose that personal debt is an indicator of integration in the financial system. As such, we argue …
What is environmental racism for? Place-based harm and relational development
This paper argues that observed environmental racisms are instrumental to the development of white places. Rather than limiting the view of environmental harms to Black communities as spatial violence enacted via white NIMBYism, we argue that such spoilage is what produces white places. We call this process ‘creative extraction,’ the taking of resources from Black places to invest in white places. Those resources range from regressive sales tax r…
King and the Other America: The Poor People's Campaign and the Quest for Economic Equality
New Directions in Critical Race Theory and Sociology: Racism, White Supremacy, and Resistance
Critical Race Theory (CRT) provides a highly generative perspective for studying racial phenomena in social, legal, and political life, but its integration with sociological theories of race has not been systematic. However, a group of sociologists has begun to show the relevance of CRT for driving empirical inquiry. This special issue (our first of two on the subject) shows the relevance of CRT for sociological theory and empirical research. In …
Against Teleology in the Study of Race: Toward the Abolition of the Progress Paradigm
We argue that claims of racial progress rest upon untenable teleological assumptions founded in Enlightenment discourse. We examine the theoretical and methodological focus on progress and its historical roots. We argue research should examine the concrete mechanisms that produce racial stability and change, and we offer three alternative frameworks for interpreting longitudinal racial data and phenomena. The first sees racism as a 'fundamental c…
When Democracy Disappears
In this case study, I look at Benton Harbor, Michigan's tenure under a state-appointed "emergency manager," with extensive local powers replacing all local elected government, and a single imperative to balance the city's budget. The law, ostensibly race-neutral, wound up targeting almost all of Michigan's cities with significant Black population. The law ultimately disenfranchised half the state's Black population but only two percent of Whites.…
Predatory Inclusion and Education Debt: Rethinking the Racial Wealth Gap
Analyses of the recent surge in racial wealth inequality have tended to focus on changes in asset holdings. Debt patterns, by contrast, have remained relatively unexplored. Using 2001 to 2013 data from the Survey of Consumer Finances, we show that after peaking in 2007, racial inequalities for most debt types returned to prefinancial crisis levels. The exception has been educational debt—on which we focus in this article. Our analyses show that e…
Mechanisms of the Racial Tax State
The relationship between taxation and structural racism is both understudied and undertheorized. Our article introducing the following symposium is a starting point to address this gap, proposing that 'a racial tax state' structures the US tax system. Grounded by contemporary race theory, we show how this seemingly innocuous and bureaucratic procedure is structured by and reproduces racial inequality. Far from a neutral and even-keeled practice, …
Rethinking racial progress: A response to Wimmer
Recent debates on racial progress in the pages of Ethnic and Racial Studies suffer from an under-theorization of the notion of progress. In this article, we draw on a well-known theory from medical sociology to argue that racism is a 'fundamental cause' of social inequality. The proximate causes of racial inequality have historically changed, but basic relations of sub- and superordination have been remarkably stable. Seeing racism as a fundament…
The White City: Race and Urban Politics
Urban regime analysis and growth machine theory offer critical tools to study power and inequality in cities. However, the field of urban politics has moved away from critically addressing race. I discuss these theories' potential contributions before suggesting scholars “bring race back” to urban politics in several key areas: studying “White urban regimes” in addition to Black urban regimes; examining how Whiteness factors into growth (and anti…
A Second Redemption? Racism, Backlash Politics, and Public Education
The Color of Money, The Best Education It Buys
Predatory Inclusion and Education Debt: Rethinking the Racial Wealth Gap
Analyses of the recent surge in racial wealth inequality have tended to focus on changes in asset holdings. Debt patterns, by contrast, have remained relatively unexplored. Using 2001 to 2013 data from the Survey of Consumer Finances, we show that after peaking in 2007, racial inequalities for most debt types returned to prefinancial crisis levels. The exception has been educational debt—on which we focus in this article. Our analyses show that e…
Creative extraction: Black towns in white space
This article interrogates the "anomalous" case of Black-founded towns, so-called because of their relative absence from discourse on Black place, their unique struggles for self-determined development, and their externally ascribed narratives of absent or dysfunctional governance, frequently invoked to explain their lack of access to basic infrastructure. We propose illuminating some of these so-called anomalies through Charles Mills' "racial con…
Against Teleology in the Study of Race: Toward the Abolition of the Progress Paradigm
We argue that claims of racial progress rest upon untenable teleological assumptions founded in Enlightenment discourse. We examine the theoretical and methodological focus on progress and its historical roots. We argue research should examine the concrete mechanisms that produce racial stability and change, and we offer three alternative frameworks for interpreting longitudinal racial data and phenomena. The first sees racism as a 'fundamental c…
What is environmental racism for? Place-based harm and relational development
This paper argues that observed environmental racisms are instrumental to the development of white places. Rather than limiting the view of environmental harms to Black communities as spatial violence enacted via white NIMBYism, we argue that such spoilage is what produces white places. We call this process ‘creative extraction,’ the taking of resources from Black places to invest in white places. Those resources range from regressive sales tax r…
The White City: Race and Urban Politics
Urban regime analysis and growth machine theory offer critical tools to study power and inequality in cities. However, the field of urban politics has moved away from critically addressing race. I discuss these theories' potential contributions before suggesting scholars “bring race back” to urban politics in several key areas: studying “White urban regimes” in addition to Black urban regimes; examining how Whiteness factors into growth (and anti…
When Democracy Disappears
In this case study, I look at Benton Harbor, Michigan's tenure under a state-appointed "emergency manager," with extensive local powers replacing all local elected government, and a single imperative to balance the city's budget. The law, ostensibly race-neutral, wound up targeting almost all of Michigan's cities with significant Black population. The law ultimately disenfranchised half the state's Black population but only two percent of Whites.…
New Directions in Critical Race Theory and Sociology: Racism, White Supremacy, and Resistance
Critical Race Theory (CRT) provides a highly generative perspective for studying racial phenomena in social, legal, and political life, but its integration with sociological theories of race has not been systematic. However, a group of sociologists has begun to show the relevance of CRT for driving empirical inquiry. This special issue (our first of two on the subject) shows the relevance of CRT for sociological theory and empirical research. In …
Rethinking racial progress: A response to Wimmer
Recent debates on racial progress in the pages of Ethnic and Racial Studies suffer from an under-theorization of the notion of progress. In this article, we draw on a well-known theory from medical sociology to argue that racism is a 'fundamental cause' of social inequality. The proximate causes of racial inequality have historically changed, but basic relations of sub- and superordination have been remarkably stable. Seeing racism as a fundament…
Mechanisms of the Racial Tax State
The relationship between taxation and structural racism is both understudied and undertheorized. Our article introducing the following symposium is a starting point to address this gap, proposing that 'a racial tax state' structures the US tax system. Grounded by contemporary race theory, we show how this seemingly innocuous and bureaucratic procedure is structured by and reproduces racial inequality. Far from a neutral and even-keeled practice, …
Critical Race Theory and Empirical Sociology
We argue that empirical sociology would benefit from a greater engagement with critical race theory (CRT). In this introduction, we outline four steps to the empirical application of CRT in sociology: (1) understanding that social science is not value neutral, (2) using CRT to inform research design and methodology, (3) investigating racism at multiple levels of analysis, and (4) empirical data and analysis should uncover the relational aspect to…
Racialized Debts: Racial Exclusion From Credit Tools and Information Networks
Research on debt highlights its use as a tool for investment and a substitute for public welfare programs. Use of debt, however, is not equal across social groups. Black households in particular have lower debt levels than white households. In this paper, we explore the context behind massive racial disparities in household debt. Conceptually, we propose that personal debt is an indicator of integration in the financial system. As such, we argue …
A Second Redemption? Racism, Backlash Politics, and Public Education
A Pathway to Racial Equity: Student Debt Cancellation Policy Designs
Student debt in the United States has had a disproportionate negative impact on black and Latinx borrowers. We argue that analyses of plans proposing student debt cancellation should therefore foreground their potential impact on racial equity. To do so, we use data from the 2019 Survey of Consumer Finances and model the impact of debt cancellation on four key policy outcomes (reach, impact on the most vulnerable borrowers, borrower wealth gains,…
Mechanisms, smoke and fun-house mirrors: When Naming Racism Is Not Enough
The White City: Race and Urban Politics
Urban regime analysis and growth machine theory offer critical tools to study power and inequality in cities. However, the field of urban politics has moved away from critically addressing race. I discuss these theories' potential contributions before suggesting scholars “bring race back” to urban politics in several key areas: studying “White urban regimes” in addition to Black urban regimes; examining how Whiteness factors into growth (and anti…
A Second Redemption? Racism, Backlash Politics, and Public Education
The Color of Money, The Best Education It Buys
Rethinking racial progress: A response to Wimmer
Recent debates on racial progress in the pages of Ethnic and Racial Studies suffer from an under-theorization of the notion of progress. In this article, we draw on a well-known theory from medical sociology to argue that racism is a 'fundamental cause' of social inequality. The proximate causes of racial inequality have historically changed, but basic relations of sub- and superordination have been remarkably stable. Seeing racism as a fundament…
Predatory Inclusion and Education Debt: Rethinking the Racial Wealth Gap
Analyses of the recent surge in racial wealth inequality have tended to focus on changes in asset holdings. Debt patterns, by contrast, have remained relatively unexplored. Using 2001 to 2013 data from the Survey of Consumer Finances, we show that after peaking in 2007, racial inequalities for most debt types returned to prefinancial crisis levels. The exception has been educational debt—on which we focus in this article. Our analyses show that e…
Mechanisms of the Racial Tax State
The relationship between taxation and structural racism is both understudied and undertheorized. Our article introducing the following symposium is a starting point to address this gap, proposing that 'a racial tax state' structures the US tax system. Grounded by contemporary race theory, we show how this seemingly innocuous and bureaucratic procedure is structured by and reproduces racial inequality. Far from a neutral and even-keeled practice, …
Against Teleology in the Study of Race: Toward the Abolition of the Progress Paradigm
We argue that claims of racial progress rest upon untenable teleological assumptions founded in Enlightenment discourse. We examine the theoretical and methodological focus on progress and its historical roots. We argue research should examine the concrete mechanisms that produce racial stability and change, and we offer three alternative frameworks for interpreting longitudinal racial data and phenomena. The first sees racism as a 'fundamental c…
When Democracy Disappears
In this case study, I look at Benton Harbor, Michigan's tenure under a state-appointed "emergency manager," with extensive local powers replacing all local elected government, and a single imperative to balance the city's budget. The law, ostensibly race-neutral, wound up targeting almost all of Michigan's cities with significant Black population. The law ultimately disenfranchised half the state's Black population but only two percent of Whites.…
New Directions in Critical Race Theory and Sociology: Racism, White Supremacy, and Resistance
Critical Race Theory (CRT) provides a highly generative perspective for studying racial phenomena in social, legal, and political life, but its integration with sociological theories of race has not been systematic. However, a group of sociologists has begun to show the relevance of CRT for driving empirical inquiry. This special issue (our first of two on the subject) shows the relevance of CRT for sociological theory and empirical research. In …
What is environmental racism for? Place-based harm and relational development
This paper argues that observed environmental racisms are instrumental to the development of white places. Rather than limiting the view of environmental harms to Black communities as spatial violence enacted via white NIMBYism, we argue that such spoilage is what produces white places. We call this process ‘creative extraction,’ the taking of resources from Black places to invest in white places. Those resources range from regressive sales tax r…
King and the Other America: The Poor People's Campaign and the Quest for Economic Equality
A Pathway to Racial Equity: Student Debt Cancellation Policy Designs
Student debt in the United States has had a disproportionate negative impact on black and Latinx borrowers. We argue that analyses of plans proposing student debt cancellation should therefore foreground their potential impact on racial equity. To do so, we use data from the 2019 Survey of Consumer Finances and model the impact of debt cancellation on four key policy outcomes (reach, impact on the most vulnerable borrowers, borrower wealth gains,…
Power, Participation, and Protest in Flint, Michigan: Unpacking the Policy Paradox of Municipal Takeovers
Creative extraction: Black towns in white space
This article interrogates the "anomalous" case of Black-founded towns, so-called because of their relative absence from discourse on Black place, their unique struggles for self-determined development, and their externally ascribed narratives of absent or dysfunctional governance, frequently invoked to explain their lack of access to basic infrastructure. We propose illuminating some of these so-called anomalies through Charles Mills' "racial con…
Critical Race Theory and Empirical Sociology
We argue that empirical sociology would benefit from a greater engagement with critical race theory (CRT). In this introduction, we outline four steps to the empirical application of CRT in sociology: (1) understanding that social science is not value neutral, (2) using CRT to inform research design and methodology, (3) investigating racism at multiple levels of analysis, and (4) empirical data and analysis should uncover the relational aspect to…
Racialized Debts: Racial Exclusion From Credit Tools and Information Networks
Research on debt highlights its use as a tool for investment and a substitute for public welfare programs. Use of debt, however, is not equal across social groups. Black households in particular have lower debt levels than white households. In this paper, we explore the context behind massive racial disparities in household debt. Conceptually, we propose that personal debt is an indicator of integration in the financial system. As such, we argue …
Socioenvironmental Injustice across the Global Divide
This paper explores the connections between two seemingly disparate cases of socioenvironmental injustice: Flint’s water crisis in Michigan, USA, and Union Carbide’s toxic chemical release in Bhopal, India. Engaging our empirical and theoretical insights from these two cases, this paper illustrates how marginalized people in distant settings can face similar socioenvironmental struggles. Considering Bhopal and Flint as instances of slow violence …
Mechanisms, smoke and fun-house mirrors: When Naming Racism Is Not Enough
Sociology (14 works) · Political science (11 works) · Gender Studies (10 works) · Economics (8 works) · Law (8 works) · Racism (8 works) · Critical Race Theory in Education (7 works) · Politics (7 works) · Gender Studies (6 works) · Race, History, and American Society (6 works)