“…I find significant variation in punishment severity by race across Pennsylvania counties, but no statistically significant contextual effects. The inability of the contextual measures to affect racial disparities in punishment decisions is puzzling in light of prior theory and research on race and punishment.It may be that other, less explored contextual factors—such as crime level (see, e.g., Britt, 2000), region of country (see, e.g., Carmichael, 2010), urbanization (see, e.g., Feld, 1999), political context (see, e.g., Helms, 2009), or religious context (see, e.g., Fearn, 2005) can better explain this variation. Indeed, in the present analysis concentrated disadvantage and crime rates were negatively associated with incarceration (but not detention) outcomes.…”