Abstract:

This paper asks a straightforward question - what happened to racially motivated hate crimes in the wake of the 7/7 terror attack that hit London in July 2005 and the 9/11 terror attack that hit the US in September 2001. There is anecdotal and statistical evidence of an increase in bias-motivated crimes since the 9/11 terrorist attacks in the US, but no quantitative research that has accurately pinned down the magnitudes of any hate crime increase that ensued. The study provides a unique estimate of the magnitude and duration of the effects of 7/7 and 9/11 on hate crime using data from four police force areas in England with sizable Asian/Arab populations. We find significant increases in hate crimes against Asians and Arabs that occurred almost immediately in the wake of both terror attacks and which lasted for a prolonged period. Moreover, hate crimes against Asians and Arabs do not return back to their pre-attack levels, showing a permanent increase in the wake of the attacks. We argue that this demonstrates a strong link between terror attacks and increases in hate crime and hypothesise that attitudinal changes from media coverage act as an underlying driver.