"In Making Hate a Crime, Valerie Jenness and Ryken Grattet show how the concept of hate crime emerged and evolved over time, as it traversed the arenas of American politics, legislatures, courts, and law enforcement.

In the process, violence against people of color, immigrants, Jews, gays and lesbians, women, and persons with disabilities has come to be understood as hate crime, while violence against other vulnerable victims - octogenarians, union members, the elderly, and police officers, for example - has not. The authors reveal the crucial role social movements played in the early formation of hate crime policy, as well as the way state and federal politicians defined the content of hate crime statutes, and how law enforcement has begun to distinguish between hate crime and "other" crime. Hate crime took on different meanings as it moved from social movement concept to law enforcement practice.

As a result, it not only acquired a deeper jurisprudential foundation but its scope of application has been restricted in some ways and broadened in others. Making Hate a Crime reveals how our current understanding of hate crime is a mix of political and legal interpretations at work in the American policy-making process."--BOOK JACKET.