Asian Americans & the Alt-right (2024)

Undergraduate: Ning Soong

Faculty Advisor: Marc Hetherington
Department: Political Science

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The alt-right is a right-wing movement increasing in prominence with tenets of white victimhood, anti-feminism, and Christian nationalism. Simultaneously, Asian Americans are rising in political influence, and are uniquely situated in the American racial hierarchy to interact differentially with the alt-right. In my thesis, I ask: What characterizes Asian Americans who embrace alt-right sentiment? How are they different from Asian Americans who do not embrace alt-right sentiment? To answer this question, I created and disseminated a nationwide survey to 715 Asian American adults, producing an original dataset on Asian American’s political thinking as it relates to the alt-right. Using multivariate linear regression, I find that the strongest predictor of Asian American agreement with white victimhood is racial resentment, which suggests that Asian Americans are driven by a sense of anti-Blackness to engage positively with white victimhood. The strongest predictor of agreement with anti-feminism is a traditional worldview. As for what causes racial resentment and traditional worldviews among Asian Americans, I find that age, gender, religiosity, and length of stay are the strongest predictors for racial resentment, and that age and religiosity are the strongest predictors for traditionalism.