Threat, prejudice and the impact of the riots in England

•A major outbreak of rioting in Britain increased ethnic prejudice.•This relationship was mediated by threats to collective safety and national culture.•Prejudice increased toward Black British and East European, not Muslim minorities.•A year later threat and prejudice had returned to pre-riots levels.•Priming memories of the riots a year later raised levels of prejudice again.

This paper examines how a major outbreak of rioting in England in 2011 impacted on prejudice toward three minority groups in Britain: Muslims, Black British and East Europeans. We test whether the riots mobilized individuals by increasing feelings of realistic and symbolic threat and ultimately prejudice, or whether the riots galvanized those already concerned about minorities, thus strengthening the relationship between threat and prejudice. We conducted three national surveys – before, after and one year on from the riots – and show that after the riots individuals were more likely to perceive threats to society’s security and culture, and by extension express increased prejudice toward Black British and East European minorities. We find little evidence of a galvanizing impact. One year later, threat and prejudice had returned to pre-riots levels; however, results from a survey experiment show that priming memories of the riots can raise levels of prejudice.