{'fraction_non_alphanumeric': 0.019776714513556618, 'fraction_numerical': 0.0009569377990430622, 'mean_word_length': 5.5744234800838575, 'pattern_counts': {'":': 0, '<': 0, '<?xml version=': 0, '>': 0, 'https://': 0, 'lorem ipsum': 0, 'www.': 0, 'xml': 0}, 'pii_count': 0, 'substrings_counts': 0, 'word_list_counts': {'cursed_substrings.json': 0, 'profanity_word_list.json': 0, 'sexual_word_list.json': 0, 'zh_pornsignals.json': 0}}
It Was Like a Fever: Storytelling in Protest and Politics

time, political gains acquired by black political empowerment have been met with continuing obstacles to civic participation by way of socioeconomic distress factors—support for the countervailing forces theory. Civic activism decreases when resources are less plentiful. But black political empowerment exerts enough force to improve the effects of this depressed civic activism. Black civic activism is dynamic over time. The results in this analysis, however, deserve more attention as far as their broader implications for African-American politics. Throughout the analyses, the downward pull of socioeconomic distress factors appears to have the greatest effect on black civic activism. This leaves unanswered whether, ultimately, black civic activism is mostly affected by the downward “push” of socioeconomic distress factors in such a way that even the rebound effects of black political empowerment (over time) have less substantive effects. Given the importance of this research for understanding how activism can enhance the benefits of democracy, several normative questions arise: (1) Can we rely on socioeconomic distress factors waxing and waning with the hopes of recovery from decreased black civic participation from the positive “pull” of black political empowerment? Or, will socioeconomic distress factors have an almost deterministically negative effect on black civic activism? (2) Do African Americans have to work toward advancing their socioeconomic status (factors beyond their control) in order to change autonomously the trend of their civic activism? What does this suggest about the causal arrows for explaining black civic activism? (3) What is the ultimate price of socioeconomic disparities for African Americans and the future of black politics and black political inclusion? The aforementioned questions do not have to be answered specifically by this research in order for the countervailing forces theory to come “full circle.” However, at times, it is unclear how the tenets of the countervailing forces theory would provide an underlying explanation to address some of these questions. Expounding on some of the issues that these questions present could give even greater meaning to the contributions of this research to the discipline. Perhaps, these questions stem from the intellectually stimulating results that this research has to offer, prompting grounds for future research in different aspects of American politics—political participation, AfricanAmerican politics, race and politics, gender and politics, and elite and mass political behavior. Most importantly, it must be recognized that Harris et al.’s research opens an interesting avenue for future black political studies: the study of political behavioral trends over time and through the use of aggregate data analysis. The book offers an interesting study of how black civic activism can be influenced by macrolevel factors. It also gives an important contribution to those who are interested in political participation in general, and/or black politics in particular.