Seeing Us in Them: Social Divisions and the Politics of Group Empathy By Cigdem V. Sirin, Nicholas Valentino and Jose Villalobos. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2021

Abstract

The racial reckoning of the summer of 2020 exemplified a rising phenomenon of outgroup empathy, with multiethnic droves braving the streets in protest to denounce the systemic oppression of Black Americans. Despite this, group empathy in the political arena has been overlooked. In Seeing Us in Them: Social Divisions and the Politics of Group Empathy, Cigdem V. Sirin, Nicholas Valentino, and Jose Villalobos remedy this lacuna in political science through their Group Empathy Theory and Group Empathy Index (GEI). Across multiple studies, they find that Latino and Black Americans exhibit more empathy toward minority groups experiencing discriminatory treatment than do Whites.