Are Patriots Bigots? An Inquiry into the Vices of In-Group Pride

Abstract

One view in the study of intergroup conflict is that pride implies prejudice. However, an increasing number of scholars have come to view in-group pride more benignly, suggesting that pride can be accompanied by a full range of feelings toward the out-group. In this article, we focus on a substantively interesting case of in-group/out-group attitudes - national pride and hostility towards immigrants. We explore the relationship in two fundamental ways: first by examining the prejudice associated with various dimensions of pride, and second by embedding these relationships in a comprehensive model of prejudice. We find that national pride is most validly measured with two dimensions - patriotism and nationalism - two dimensions that have very different relationships with prejudice. While nationalists have a strong predilection for hostility towards immigrants, patriots show no more prejudice than does the average citizen.