We examine whether affirmative action produces backlash effects for the most privileged ethnic group by exploiting a unique historical setting originating from a forced assimilation program, the Italianization of South Tyrol. The program, implemented by the fascist regime, imposed entry barriers for non-Italian speakers in the public administration sector of the labor market. The specialization of Italians persisted until hard quotas were announced in 1966. We document that the announcement induced a marked increase in the support for a nationalist and openly anti-German party in municipalities where such specialization was more pronounced. A text analysis of the speeches of 196 members of the Italian parliament (MPs) recorded in 3,820 verbatim reports further shows that, during the announcement period, MPs of the nationalist party reinforced Germans’ negative traits that characterized the historical tensions between the two groups (“Nazis” or “terrorists”). Our results suggest that the expectation of affirmative action can rapidly activate the salience of ethnic boundaries and, in turn, promote ethnic hatred.

我们通过利用源自强制同化计划（南蒂罗尔的意大利化）的独特历史背景​​，研究平权行动是否会对最有特权的族群产生反弹效应。该计划由法西斯政权实施，为劳动力市场的公共行政部门的非意大利语人士设置了进入壁垒。意大利人的专业化一直持续到 1966 年宣布硬配额。我们记录到，在这种专业化更为明显的城市，该公告导致对民族主义和公开反德政党的支持显着增加。对记录在 3,820 份逐字记录中的 196 名意大利议会议员的讲话进行的文本分析进一步表明，在公告期间，民族主义政党的议员强化了德国人的负面特征，这些特征是两个团体（“纳粹”或“恐怖分子”）之间历史紧张局势的特征。我们的研究结果表明，对平权行动的期望可以迅速激活种族界限的显着性，进而促进种族仇恨。