More than Rocks and Stone: Confederate Monuments, Memory Movements, and Race

Iexamine why Confederate monuments were built in public spaces in counties throughout the US South with particular attention to connections to race. I use event history analysis to examine the overall likelihood of erecting the first monument in a county while accounting for dimensions of time. The data include a comprehensive accounting of public Confederate monuments, covariates spanning 150 years, and several unique historical variables. This is the first study to assess competing explanations for the construction of Confederate monuments in a generalizable analysis. Results provide support for understanding Confederate monuments as part of a larger “memory movement.” Moreover, this movement was strongly related to the relationship between race and power within a county. However, my analyses offer limited support for viewing Confederate monuments as part of a countermovement in response to local racial tensions. Incorporating the nuances of how race relates to Confederate monuments will be valuable to future research as scholars develop an understanding of their links to contemporary society.