Taking Down The Flag Is a Solution in Search of a Problem ... And I Mean That In a Good Way.

The gift shop in the Museum of the Confederacy, Richmond, Va.

By Hans Noel

In the last several days, a number of politicians have called for or acted to remove confederate flags[1] from display. Some businesses will no longer sell the flag. The change follows the attack on the Charleston Emanuel AME Church, now known to be the work of white supremacist Dylann Roof. The policy change has been unusually swift.

I’ve since seen a number of people, on the left and the right, criticize the focus on the confederate flag. Whatever the merits of the flag, its removal probably wouldn’t have stopped Roof, so why are we directing our attention there?

I don’t know if the flag’s removal is the best response to the Charleston attacks, but it’s not at all surprising. It’s a perfect illustration of the way policy agendas shape policy change, a model we can trace to John Kingdon, with significant contributions from Frank Baumgartner and Bryan Jones, among others.

The idea is that policy ideas are almost always solutions in search of a problem. Or rather, they are solutions to a different long-standing problem. This policy stream is nurtured by activists who want to see it enacted, and then an event happens which creates the opportunity to do something, and the activists convince policymakers that their solution is that something.

This doesn't explain why the confederate flag became that something this time, but the policy streams approach does suggest why it might be.

• The issue was a little salient because the Supreme Court has just ruled that the state of Texas doesn't have to issue license plates with the flag. 
• The state and national flags at the South Carolina capitol were lowered to honor those killed in Charleston, but the confederate flag on the grounds was not. 
• The Emanuel AME Church was the site of violence during the civil rights movement, which highlights the connection between the killing and symbols of racial intolerance.
• Many politicians downplayed the racial motives of the killer until they were demonstrated, leaving them with a need to demonstrate that they now understood those motives.

Those factors together make removing the flag an easy way to do something about the shooting.

Once you recognize that most policy changes are the result of activists capitalizing on events, it's hard to view any one example as a bad thing. If you think the flag shouldn't fly, then you should take the victory when you can get it.

But the criticism can also be explained by reference to the policy streams approach. Liberals, who would generally be happy with the flag coming down, nevertheless would like to see bigger policy changes, particularly gun control. The policy window opened after the Newton shootings wasn't enough to enact change, but maybe this would be. Conservatives might be happy that the shooting hasn't been used to justify new gun restrictions, but they aren't happy to see Southern culture blamed for the attacks. And some may have their own policy agenda they'd like to see enacted.


[1] As a side note, I'd like to remind commentators that the flags in question are mostly the confederate battle flag, also often known as the flag of the Army of Northern Virginia. They mostly not the original national flag of the confederacy, although three different national flags were flying in Alabama, alongside the battle flag The battle flag is also not the "Stars and Bars." That's the nickname of the first confederate national flag, which looks a lot like the early United States flag, except instead of 13 skinny red and white stripes, it has three wide red-and-white bars.

This bit of trivia is interesting (well, to me it is) for two reasons. First, it reminds us that many Southerners viewed themselves as the "real" America during the Civil War, and thus a flag similar to the U.S. flag was appealing. Second, it reminds us that the battle flag became the de facto symbol of the confederacy much later than during the Civil War. That was the work of anti-civil rights activists, looking for a symbol for their defense of Jim Crow. The reason so many see the flag as a symbol of racism is that it was once consciously adopted as a symbol of racism.