Demographic Foundations of Political Empowerment in Multiminority ...

Demography, Vol. 32, No.2, May 1995

Demographic Foundations of Political Empowerment in Multiminority Cities William A.V. Clark Department of Geography, UCLA 405 Hilgard Ave. Los Angeles, CA 90024

Peter A. Morrison RAND 1700 Main St. Santa Monica, CA 90407 As U.S. cities accommodate increasing ethnic and racial diversity, political choices may unify or divide their local populations. Those choices pull communities toward two different modes of pluralism: traditional "melting pot" assimilation or a complex mosaic of racial and ethnic assertiveness. Central to this issue is equity and empowerment, which may be accentuated by minority populations' size, structure, and spatial concentration. We examine two potential modes of local empowerment: "dominance," whereby each group is the majority of voters in single election districts (reinforcing separative tendencies), and "influence," whereby a group gains "influential minority" status in several districts (reinforcing unifying tendencies).

In communities with increasing minority populations, a central concern is the representation and empowerment of racial and ethnic groups. This issue has important political, social, and legal implications (see, for example, de la Garza and DeSipio 1993; Guinier 1994; Schlesinger 1992; Skerry 1993; Takaki 1993). Efforts to create representation, or achieve empowerment, are influenced directly by the size, demographic structure, and spatial concentrations of minority populations. Local demography therefore is at the heart of the issue. In this paper we examine how underlying demography can shape minority empowerment and either enhance or limit its possibilities. Our fundamental thesis is that the influence of demography on empowerment can reinforce communities' local tendencies to divide along ethnic lines or to unify around common local interests. A particular minority's sheer numbers-its demographic presence-may translate into a greater or lesser political presence according to how those numbers are empowered. Federal law (most notably the Voting Rights Act of 1965, as amended in 1982) has addressed the issue of "protected" minority-group empowerment. In traditional "majority-minority" cities (where one group enjoys the majority demographic presence), federal efforts have clearly benefited African-Americans' political participation (see, for

* Revised version of a paper presented at the session on Demography, Politics, and the Law at the annual meetings of the Population Association of America, held in April 1993 in Cincinnati. We thank Chase Langford, Rae Starr, and Robert Weissler for preparing the maps herein. Views expressed here are the authors', not those of RAND or sponsors of Its research. Copyright © 1995 Population Association of America

183

184


example, Black and Black 1987:134ff; O'Hare et a1. 1991:33-35). In racially and ethnically pluralistic settings (where no group is the majority), the structure and spatial distribution of the various populations complicate traditional patterns of political empowerment. Occasionally one group can be empowered only at the expense of another. More generally, the demography of ethnic pluralism may well reinforce ethnic separatism and foster interethnic tension, depending on how each individual group comes to be empowered. Our central point is that demographic factors can exert an indirect but enduring influence on the political and social fabric of multiminority communities. The demographic influence will express itself through the geographic boundaries these communities adopt for electoral purposes and how those boundaries are "fit" to the residential patterns found in multiminority communities. The critical aspect of such boundaries is which of two latent political tendencies they express and reinforce. Drawn in one way, boundaries can provide a particular group with its own "territory" and political dominance, reinforcing residential tendencies toward ethnic separatism within the community. Drawn in another way, boundaries can make individual ethnic groups influential enough to form politically dominant coalitions within certain districts, thereby weakening separatist tendencies in these districts and perhaps across the entire community. Although diversity is emerging across metropolitan America, the demographics of this phenomenon are most apparent in California. In California, one of every four cities above 50,000 in population has no racial or ethnic majority of any kind; neither Anglos nor Hispanics nor blacks nor Asians constitute a majority of the population. Such settings are the likely precursors of a national pattern in large cities.' Although the issues we pose are politically familiar, their demographic underpinnings have been articulated less fully. Extending our earlier exploration of the subject (Clark and Morrison 1992; Morrison 1994), we argue that the demography of multiminority settings merits close study, especially to clarify how the demographic circumstances in a community may shape its future political realities. Our studies of such settings disclose both unrecognized limits on minority empowerment and noteworthy opportunities. Both elements derive from an interplay of structural, socioeconomic, and geographical factors (see de la Garza and DeSipio 1993). Structural factors include the differences among groups along lines of age and citizenship-factors that determine who can participate politically. Disparities among groups in the fraction who are adult citizens affect the relative numbers within each group who are eligible to vote or to serve as jurors. The contrast is sometimes striking. In Dinuba, California, for example, Hispanics are 60% of the city's total population; nonHispanics, however, are 60% of the adult citizens (persons eligible to vote). Thus, as a result of structural factors alone, a mostly non-Hispanic electorate selects the city council that governs this mostly Hispanic city. Socioeconomic factors often compound the above effects, influencing the likelihood that people eligible to participate will actually do so. Educational attainment, for example, strongly influences voter registration and voter turnout (see Avey 1989; de la Garza et a1. 1992; Uhlaner, Cain, and Kiewiet 1987; Wolfinger and Rosenstone 1980). In the context of socioeconomic differences, class effects may be intertwined with political outcomes. When higher-SES groups register and tum out to vote in larger numbers than lower-SES groups, the trade-off between dominance and influence will be affected. A number of political science studies, including reviews by Flanigan and Zingale (1987) and Avey (1989), have confirmed that people who vote are often better off economically. This tendency is also greater in low-interest elections and hence has particular effects in local contests. Geographically, one group's degree of spatial concentration relative to others in the population determines how fully its numbers can influence or dominate electoral choice within single-member election districts (SMDs). Election districts can be configured

Political Empowerment

185

purposely to encompass and concentrate-and thereby empower-some "community of interest." Forming a district so that most of its voters are "us" enables a group to elect its favored candidate to represent its interests on the city council, the school board, or other governing body. For blacks (who typically are highly concentrated in cities), such empowerment is often relatively straightforward. Asians, by contrast, tend to be scattered residentially; this situation precludes political empowerment via SMDs. Hispanics generally are intermediate between these two extremes; a majorityHispanic district mayor may not be feasible. Every "us," however, implies a "them." In pluralistic locales, the structural, socioeconomic, and territorial differences among groups may well separate or unify, depending on how each group's numbers find political expression. The evidence on this point remains suggestive and controversial (see, for example, Guinier 1993; Portes and Zhou 1994; Skerry 1993). Nevertheless, the issue posed here will grow more important in coming years as more communities acquire the multiminority demographic structure so commonplace now in California cities. Magnifying the national concern with pluralism is the renewed focus on the government's scheme for classifying the population racially and ethnically. It is the practice of classification that tends to generate the issue we have posed here (see Alonso and Starr 1987; Webster 1992). As of 1995, several separate racial/ethnic groups with common interests were pressing the federal Office of Management and Budget for official recognition on the 2000 census. The growing pressures to change the palette for portraying the nation's rainbow of races on the 2000 census evidence a broader public concern with the issue of "community of interest." Communities of interest have been defined as territorial groups of people with common economic, social, and political interests (Grofman 1985). They can be identified by a wide variety of characteristics ranging from patterns of residence to journey-to-work flows (Shelley 1994). Communities of interest often overlap with ethnic or racial identity and political influence; this overlap of ethnicity, or race, with nonracial interests complicates the emphasis on unity or separateness within a city. (Portes and Zhou 1994 offer contemporary illustrations.) Ultimately the issue is the extent to which the boundary-drawing enhances the collective interest of one group or of several groups. Insofar as district boundaries merge communities of interest, separate them, or favor one over another, boundary-drawing itself may reinforce any latent tendencies toward unity or conflict, which the relative sizes and characteristics of populations then may magnify.

CONTEXT AND CONCEPTUAL STRUCTURE Demographic changes often go unrecognized until they confront the nation with new needs on a widespread scale. Empowering "protected minority" groups has emerged as a national issue, notably in California, because of the state's racial and ethnic diversity. Yet although ethnic/racial pluralism is highly visible in that state, it is also emerging across the nation and, as in California, will transform the composition of local electorates, especially in large cities. More generally, attention will focus on the political means whereby local jurisdictions accommodate pluralism. This issue pulls communities in separate directions toward two different visions: one, the traditional conception (however exaggerated) of "melting pot" assimilation; the other, a more complex mosaic of racial and ethnic assertiveness, with an array of groups demanding equity. Two possible modes of group empowerment in multigroup settings become salient. In the dominance mode, one group is assured majority status among electors, which enables it to elect its candidates of choice by sheer numbers. This mode of empowerment, however, is feasible only under certain demographic conditions-namely, where the group is large and

186


geographically compact enough to constitute the majority of voting-age citizens in a "safe" single-member district. The dominance mode of empowerment reinforces any existing separative tendencies, both political and territorial: New York City's recently formed system of 51 council districts naturally gravitates toward separateness under the demographically pluralistic conditions that prevail in New York (see Gartner 1993). The influence mode, by contrast, empowers the group in question by concentrating its members sufficiently to give it "influential minority" status among the electors in several districts rather than one. As a result, the group can elect candidates of its choice, either with the help of a predictable number of crossover votes from other groups or through reliance on an alternative scheme such as cumulative voting. The latter enables a numerical minority to concentrate its voting power behind a particular candidate, even though the minority voters themselves are not necessarily concentrated geographically in a single district (see Guinier 1993, 1994)2. By forming several such "influence" districts (instead of only one "safe" district), this mode of empowerment encourages political alliance and coalition voting among the several minority groups in those districts. It reinforces any tendencies toward unity that may exist in the larger community. This elementary distinction between "dominance" and "influence" modes of empowerment has fundamental significance in local multi minority settings. In such settings, the distinctive demographic features of each particular minority population may strongly condition what mode of empowerment it finds feasible. "Dominance" and "influence" derive in tum from two differing conceptualizations of open societies such as the United States, with long traditions of immigration. In the past, the common view of immigration rested on the familiar (even if exaggerated) assimilation paradigm: the "melting pot," whereby people from diverse backgrounds slowly assimilated or adapted, forming various coalitions among groups along the way (Glazer 1993). Salient questions revolved around the nature and process of assimilation. The melting pot metaphor was the framework for both interpreting and anticipating ethnic trajectories in urban America. As ethnic groups advanced socioeconomically, they shed their separate identities and merged with the dominant society. Eventually ethnic identity lost salience; within several generations, members of a group became members of the "majority" (Schlesinger 1992). Although the melting pot paradigm is not entirely irrelevant in California today, opposite tendencies also are visible in some places. They suggest that a complex racial and ethnic mosaic, in which groups of people do not simply cling to their separate identities but emphasize them, might be a better image." The contrast here is between the classic conceptualization of ethnic adaptation, in which each new immigrant group goes through a similar process of cultural and social adaptation to the dominant "American" culture (Gans 1991), and visions of ethnic pluralism and separation, in which diversity rather than acculturation is the defining force (Glazer 1993). Separatism has acquired spatial expression in the form of sometimes gerrymandered election districts such as North Carolina's 12th Congressional District (see Figure 1). Such political works of art express an "ethnic mosaic" worldview of political cohesiveness premised on the separateness of groups." A wide spectrum of views on this subject exists at the highest level of the federal judiciary, and several Supreme Court justices have expressed their discomfort with racially determined districts. Concurring opinions in Holder v. Hall noted the unfortunate irony in using a form of electoral "apartheid" to remedy inadequate representation: "We have involved the federal courts, and indeed the Nation, in the enterprise of systematically dividing the country into electoral districts along racial lines-an enterprise of segregating the races into political homelands that amounts, in truth, to nothing short of a system of 'political apartheid' " (1994:9210).5 This irony is particularly relevant to multi minority communities and their distinctive

187


North Carolina's 12th Congressional District

50 Miles

Figure 1. North Carolina's 12th Congressional District

residential settlement patterns. A "safe" district delineated to remedy injustice for one minority (e.g., Latinos) may reproduce such injustice by denying representation to another minority (e.g., African-Americans) in the same district. The shift from assimilation to separation can be viewed in the context of three important aspects of recent immigration to the United States, which distinguish it from earlier experience. First, the recent waves of immigrants include a wider range of ethnicities and races (see Edmonston and Passel 1994). Second, the more recent immigration involves a larger proportion of undocumented immigrants, a trend that is unlikely to be curtailed in the near future. Despite the 1986 attempt to control population inflow with the Immigration Reform and Control Act, we see no evidence of an end to the largescale immigration, which rivals its counterpart in the peak years of 1900-1910 (Bean, Edmonston, and Passel 1990; Bean and Fix 1992; Espenshade 1992). During the 1980s, 6 million legal immigrants were admitted to the United States (Fix and Passel 1994). The important point here is the prospect that the trend toward ethnic separatism may eclipse processes of assimilation. Third, the current immigration coincides with an era in which the legal process strongly emphasizes the rights of discrete insular groups, an atmosphere very different from that of the early decades of this century. These developments, in our view, could reinforce the separatist tendencies inherent in the urban mosaic. This notion is becoming increasingly common in arenas where various groups' political interests contrast or conflict. For example, the composition of jury pools receives increased scrutiny in the face of pressures to make juries reflect local communities. Likewise, there are more calls to elect local officials from singlemember districts rather than from the jurisdiction at large. These contrasting conceptualizations of the urban mosaic focus attention on the political means by which pluralism is accommodated on the local scale. Should that accommodation acknowledge the separatist tendencies, a position implying ethnic empowerment through a partitioning of space, as exemplified in Figure I? Or should it seek to combine like-minded groups, thus enabling them to coalesce, by forming and reforming alliances, into a unified political majority? In the following sections we apply these distinctions regarding the modes of empowerment to the demographic features of several

188


California localities, which illuminate these conceptualizations. We explore how the emerging demographic features of pluralism in these settings shape the empowerment of particular groups.

AGGREGATE EFFECTS AND SPATIAL PATTERNS ON MACRO SCALES As noted earlier, demographic variations have important scale dimensions; these, in tum, have varying political outcomes. Los Angeles County affords an illustration of the aggregate effects and their ramifications for large, ethnically diverse metropolitan areas. In 1990, Los Angeles County had 3.3 million Hispanic inhabitants, or approximately 38% of the county's entire population. The county's large, rapidly increasing Hispanic population has prompted substantial political and legal concern about Hispanic representation in government and on petit and grand juries. This intersection of the county's demography with the political empowerment of its Hispanic and other minority residents accentuates a distinction between "melting pot" and "mosaic" perspectives. Most political issues pertaining to representation and jury service involve the adult (18 and older) population and citizenship. Among the principal racial/ethnic groups in Los Angeles County, these two demographic characteristics vary considerably. Hispanics constituted 33.3% of the county's adult population in 1990 but only 19.8% of the adult citizens (Figure 2). Inevitably, the Hispanics' electoral presence falls short of their demographic presence, but the actual shortfall is even more extreme. Hispanics make up only 14.1% of the county's registered voters (according to Spanish surnames); they constitute only 11.0% of prospective petit jurors and 6.7% of the grand jury pool. 6 Representation and empowerment are complicated further by a particular group's ability (or inability) to influence the political process. Thus, limited fluency in English and limited educational attainment also have effects. Inability to speak English, for example, diminishes Hispanics' presence among prospective jurors; their lack of competent English may lead to disqualification, at least from grand jury pools. Although Hispanics make up 19.8% of all adult citizens, they are only 17.2% of those who speak English at least "well" and 14.3% of those who speak English "very well" (Fig. 3). Hispanics, then, account for one of every three adults in Los Angeles County; yet they constitute only one of every seven registered voters and only one of every 15 prospective grand jurors. A deficit of citizenship and limited facility with English (along with other factors) systematically restrict political representation and participation. The disparities shown in Figures 2 and 3 also have important spatial features: the deficit of citizens is greatest in certain areas of the county. Figure 4 identifies a central area of the county where fewer than half of all adults are citizens. This deficit is more extensive for certain groups (Figure 5). For Hispanics (upper panel), the most dramatic aspect is the dominant peripheral pattern of high citizenship levels in areas of generally higher socioeconomic status and lower Hispanic concentration. For Asians (lower panel), the spatial pattern is more scattered. Because of the geography of citizenship, election districts drawn to concentrate each group would empower each group's eligible voters to varying degrees. The aggregate countywide pattern for language ability also exhibits important spatial features (Figure 6). Areas with the highest concentrations of adults with limited English fluency correspond closely to areas with the lowest concentrations of citizenship (compare Figure 4 with Figure 6). Spatial patterns of limited English fluency would magnify

189


Percent Hispanic

40%

30%

20%

10%

0% Population 18+

Citizens 18+

Registrants

Prospective Jurors

Sources: Unpublished tabulations of 1990 Census data on voting-age citizens; 1990 registered voters' surnames from Los Angeles County Registrar of Voters; data from Los Angeles County Grand Jury Wheels (six-year average). Figure 2. Presence of Hispanics among adult residents, citizens, registered voters, and prospective Jurors Angeles County, 1990

In

Los


190

Percent Hispanic

25°/c

20%

10%

5%

0% All

Speak English Speak Speak Very Well Some English English Well

Sources: Unpublished tabulations of 1990 Census data on voting-age citizens. Figure 3. Presence of Hispanics among adult citizens in Los Angeles County, by fluency in English, 1990


191

PERCENTAGE OF POPULATION 18+

_= _=

WHO ARE CITIZENS

Under 30% 30% - 45% Over 45%

0=

San Fernando Valley

t«: liz, ..

EJ

~~0~ LW'

~East

L.A.

r-----~

~

Figure 4. Percentage of all adults who are citizens, Los Angeles County

disparities attributable to citizenship alone. Thus the geographic concentrations and dispersions within and across political jurisdictions affect the possibilities for empowering groups.

MINORITY EMPOWERMENT ON THE LOCAL SCALE Local circumstances further complicate the demographic foundations of political empowerment. In this section we examine several examples illustrating how structural differences between groups produce divergences between the composition of local populations and of local electorates, how socioeconomic differences magnify those divergences, and how differing approaches to districting may reinforce or moderate the tendencies toward ethnic separatism.

An Example of Influence: The City of Alhambra Within Los Angeles County are dozens of cities that mirror the various facets of countywide diversity. One such city is Alhambra, with a population (shown in Table 1)

192


PERCENTAGE OF HISPANICS 18+

_= _=

WHO ARE CITIZENS

0=

Under 30% 30% - 45% Over 45%

San Fernando Valley

East L.A.

PERCENTAGE OF ASIANS 18+

_= _=

-I

WHO ARE CITIZENS

0= '--

Under 30% 30% - 45% Over 45%

Ii 1

Figure 5. Percentage of Hispanic and Asian adults who are citizens. Los Angeles County


193

\------r-;ERCENTAGE OF POPULATION 18+

\

\

i

NOT FLUENT IN ENGLISH·

I

Under 30% ~i§= 30% - 45% Over 45%

I~J =

_=

I

~ ~~

j

Ea~L.A.

r/P

(,

~y

Figure 6. Percentage of adults who speak English "not well" or "not at all," Los Angeles County

composed of three principal groups: Asian/Pacific Islanders (37% of all city dwellers), Hispanics (36%), and non-Hispanic whites or "Angios" (24%). Blacks account for most of the tiny remaining fraction. Table 1. Population of Alhambra by Hispanic Origin and Race: 1990

Group Total, All Persons Hispanic Origin (Of Any Race) Not of Hispanic Origin White Black Asian or PI All other races

Population (All Ages)

Citizens 18 +

No. Distribution

No. Distribution

82,106

100.0%

40,778

100.0%

29,626

36.1%

13,413

32.9%

19,924 1,482 30,715 359

24.3% 1.8% 37.4% 0.4%

16,619 963 9,543 240

40.7% 2.4% 23.4% 0.6%

Source: Census of Population and Housing, 1990: PL 94-171, data and unpublished special tabulation of citizens.

194


Alhambra's voting-age citizen population differs markedly from the population as a whole. Because of group differences in age structure and citizenship, the rank order of the city's three largest groups is completely reversed." Asians constitute only 23% of all voting-age citizens; Hispanics make up a substantially larger share (33%); Anglos are the largest group of all (41 %). Demographically, Alhambra is a city in which each group's relative demographic presence may translate into a noticeably different political presence at election time. Under these circumstances, what modes of empowerment are feasible? Alhambra's voters now elect their five city council members "at large," a format under which candidates must compete citywide for support from voters. Of the city's five current council members, one is Hispanic and the other four are Anglos. Asian candidates have run for city council, but thus far none has won a seat. Past elections offer no indications that Alhambra's electorate is racially or ethnically polarized. Presumably any candidate Asian, Hispanic, black, or Anglo-who could obtain citywide support could win a seat on the city council. Alhambra's election system, then, is attuned to coalitional voting, but not necessarily along racial or ethnic lines. Given Alhambra's existing multiminority structure, how might each racial/ethnic group pursue its own empowerment? No single group is numerous enough to dominate the outcome of an election; yet any pair of groups could form a potentially winning alliance. One possibility would be to change from the existing at-large election system to a system of single-member districts. Here the question becomes "Should the community favor empowerment through 'safe' districts or through 'influence' districts?" In fact, the city's residential structure precludes the former (except possibly for Anglos). Demographically it is impossible to form separate districts in which either Asians or Hispanics can be an electoral majority; neither group is concentrated sufficiently in anyone part of the city to form a majority of all voting-age citizens in a district containing the necessary one-fifth of Alhambra's total population. Another possibility is feasible, however: configuring a system of five single member districts in which each group enjoys "influential minority" status. Table 2 summarizes such a configuration, in which Asians enjoy a 42% share of the votingage population in District 2 (substantially more than either Hispanics or Anglos there), Hispanics enjoy a 43% share in District 5 (substantially more than either Asians or Anglos there), and Anglos enjoy a 3707c share in District 1 (more than either Asians or Hispanics there). In short, this five-district plan empowers each group by making it the most influential minority in one district, thereby increasing the likelihood that the group will elect the candidate of its choice. The premise underlying this approach to empowerment is that people vote along racial/ethnic lines; changing to such a system of electing local officials would acknowledge the salience of racial and ethnic identity in Alhambra. Retaining the existing at large system, by contrast, would accord with the absence (thus far) of cohesive voting based on race or ethnicity.

Influence versus Dominance: The Community of Long Beach In a second example, the demographic foundations of empowerment present options that can magnify or reduce tendencies toward ethnic separatism. The Long Beach Community College District (LBCCD) is an ethnically diverse jurisdiction that includes the incorporated cities of Long Beach, Lakewood, and Signal Hill. Its population of 467,000 is 52% non-Hispanic white, 23% Hispanic, 12% black, and 12% Asian/Pacific Islander. LBCCD's governing board of trustees had been elected at large before 1993 but was proposing to change to election by single-member districts. In 1993, LBCCD's Redistricting Subcommittee considered various potential seven-district plans devised to meet three guidelines: 1) respecting the boundaries of the two

16,421

Ideal Tot Dev.

12,682

12,838 12,606 12,579 12,559 12,829 63,411

No.

2.2%

-

1.2% -0.6% -0.8% -1.0% 1.2%

% Dev.

Population 18 +

30.0% 30.0% 39.0% 34.3% 46.7% 36.1%

Total 26.8% 27.6% 35.8% 31.1% 42.7% 32.8%

18+

% Hispanic

2.5% 1.3% 2.1% 0.8% 2.3% 1.8%

Total

2.4% 1.3% 2.2% 0.8% 2.5% 1.8%

18+

% Black a

33.8% 43.4% 39.7% 41.6% 28.6% 37.4%

Total

33.8% 42.3% 40.3% 41.1% 29.3% 37.3%

18+

% Asian/PIa

Note: "% dev." is each district's relative deviation from ideal. "Tot. Dev." is the sum of the largest negative and largest positive relative deviations regardless of sign. Source: Census of Population and Housing, 1990: PL 94--171 data. a Non-Hispanic only.

4.3%

-2.6% -0.5% 1.5% 0.0% 1.7%

15,994 16,339 16,662 16,414 16,697 82,106

1 2 3 4 5 Totals

-

% Dev.

No.

Council District

Population (All Ages

Table 2. Plantto Accord Each Group Its Own "Influence" District, City of Alhambra

'C

Ul

-

~

=

-

3

~

1.,

3

t"'l

!.

;::;.

-~

196


minor cities (Lakewood and Signal Hill); 2) favoring geographically compact districts; and 3) enhancing the voting strength of individual protected groups (Hispanics, blacks, and Asians). Thus it was necessary to advance the third objective without compromising the first two. The demography of LBCCD poses a political choice of how to pursue these aims: Districts can be formed to afford either dominance or influence to a particular ethnic group. The "dominance" approach results in a plan aimed at concentrating Hispanic voting strength in a single district. The most extreme variant (outlined in Figure 7) would give Hispanics a 53.2% majority in the votingage population in District 1. (Such a majority is close to the 53.9% upper limit possible in any single district.) The irregular boundaries of this district are the necessary result of attempting to concentrate one ethnic group as much as possible. A similar exercise aimed at concentrating blacks' voting strength within a single district illustrates the complications inherent in multiminority settings. That district (the shaded District 1 in Figure 7) largely overlaps the outlined District 1 with a Hispanic concentration. Thus an effort to concentrate blacks' voting strength in a single district dilutes Hispanics' voting strength, and vice versa." The "influence" approach, by contrast, fosters opportunities for potential coalitions among influential minorities. The illustrative plan shown in Figure 8 features three "majorityminority" districts-that is, districts in which Hispanics, blacks, and Asians collectively are the majority of the population. Such districts accentuate the coalitional possibilities inherent in the geographic overlap of various minorities rather than the concentration of any single group's separate voting strength within a single district (as in Figure 7). These three districts offer a variety of potential "majority-minority" alliances among Hispanics, blacks, Asians and Pacific Islanders, and Anglos (see Table 3). For example, District I enables any possible pair of minority groups together to form a numerical majority within the total population (the particular base chosen for use). Two of the three districts (#1 and #3) enable Hispanics together with one other minority to form a numerical majority. One of the three districts (# I) enables blacks together with Asians/Pacific Islanders to form a numerical majority. Two of the three districts (# 1 and #5) enable blacks together with Asians/Pacific Islanders to constitute a plurality among minorities. The creation of "influence" districts gives each group some advantages. In District 3, for example, Hispanics are numerous enough to anchor any multiminority coalition (e.g., an alliance between Hispanics and blacks or between Hispanics and Anglos). In two districts (# 1 and #5), blacks are numerous enough to be an essential part of any multiminority coalition. In one district (#1), Asians/Pacific Islanders are numerous enough to be necessary in any multiminority coalition. Redistricting in LBCCD, then, illustrates how local demography implies choices in drawing political boundaries, either to magnify or to reduce ethnic separatism.

The Tension between Influence and Dominance: The City of EI Centro It is not a simple task to determine exactly how electors will respond to ethnic candidates. In local elections in EI Centro, for example, the success of candidates cannot be deduced immediately from the ethnic structure of the city. EI Centro has a population of 31,000, of whom 65% are Hispanic, 28% Anglo, 4% black, and 2% Asian/Pacific Islander. Yet although Hispanics are a majority of the population, they account for only 35% of the city's registered voters and only 27% of those who turned out to vote in 1990 (Morrison 1993). Among the 17 council members elected in the past seven elections, however, three are black and three are Asian; four others are Hispanic. Thus the majority of the 17 winners have been members of some "protected" minority, elected at large in a city where seven of


197

Figure 7. Overlap of potential districts to concentrate either Hispanic or black voting strength, Long Beach Community College District

10 registrants who voted are Anglos. Moreover, six of these 10 "protected minority" winners belong to racial minorities (black or Asian) who do not constitute even 5% of EI Centro's voting-age population. EI Centro presents a classic case of the confrontation between "dominance" and


198

'~1~+1-J::t:1=l--+--+--J;~~ \

L..."..--.---------l

::.3" I

j

j ,.''''

1Iiii. . -!'.'.!.---i--!~"\

! .

.

~

/_._\ __ =.-_+---_-==--t-·~?_'(~'~_·%;;.~i -- 0::

!!LVD

•

r

··,,~__'I,--..-·-1

Figure 8. Plan featuring three "majority-minority" districts, Long Beach Community College District

"influence" modes of intervention and empowerment. Because Hispanics are 35% of all registrants citywide, it is clearly possible to create a configuration that would maximize Hispanic voting strength within a single voting district. Inevitably, however, such a configuration would dilute the voting strength of the city's small (but demonstrably cohesive) black population because blacks are intermingled residentially with Hispanics in the most heavily Hispanic part of EI Centro. This intermingling exists at the block level: blacks are clustered together in tiny enclaves (typically two to four contiguous city blocks). Most such enclaves are separated from each other by heavily Hispanic corridors several city blocks wide. Ironically, this intermingled residential pattern of blacks and Hispanics limits the extent to which public policy could enhance Hispanics' voting strength without simultaneously diluting that of blacks. Conversely, one could go only so far toward preserving blacks' voting strength without simultaneously diluting that of Hispanics.

199


Table 3. Influential Minorities in Each District, Long Beach Community College District Group's Share of Total Population

District I 2

3 4

5 6 7

Hispanic Hispanic Hispanic Hispanic Hispanic Hispanic Hispanic

(36.4%) (13.6%) (48.6%) (17.6%) (25.9%) (10.4%) (8.0%)

Black Asian/PI Asian/PI Black Black Asian/PI Asian/PI

(27.1 %) (10.7%) (19.0%) (10.6%) (21.1 %) (5.7%) (5.4%)

Asian/PI Black Black Asian/PI Asian/PI Black Black

(24.3%) (9.7%) (14.2%) (10.5%) (14.0%) (2.8%) (1.5%)

Most noteworthy, however, is that significant numbers of black, Asian, and Hispanic candidates have managed to be elected under the unifying influences of the city's existing at-large election system. Although most of EI Centro's voters are Anglo, most of the candidates elected under this system have been Asian, black, or Hispanic.

CONCLUSIONS As more cities have become significantly more ethnically diverse, the relationship between the numerical presence of a protected group and the effective political presence of that group has emerged as an issue of national importance to political scientists and courts. Demography is already at the heart of the issue in California; it is bound to become more salient in other regions of the nation as well. This issue is highlighted in recent Supreme Court decisions (notably Shaw v. Reno, Holder v. Hall, and Johnson v. De Grandy) and in the unresolved tensions between principles of law which those decisions reflect (see Murphy 1991a, 199Ib). We have explored actual local examples illustrating how groups might elect candidates of their choice without the requirement of ethnically separate single-member districtsdistricts that may balkanize the political landscape and may, in the words of the Supreme Court (in Shaw v. Reno), bear "an uncomfortable resemblance to political apartheid" (1993: 8173). Implementation of the Voting Rights Act requires close attention to the racial/ethnic concentration in local voting-age citizen populations. The law has buttressed efforts to empower particular minorities by concentrating their numbers in a single political district. Likewise, laws pertaining to jury representativeness rely on measures of minority representation in the pools from which prospective jurors are drawn. The law limits the degree of permissible statistical disparity between a group's presence in the community and its presence on juries of peers rendering verdicts. Age structure, citizenship status, and language ability all influence this relationship, apart from any explicit eligibility criteria. The law itself also defines certain qualifications that determine eligibility-age and citizenship, for example, or English-language proficiency. As the nation's urban mosaic increases in racial and ethnic complexity, "minoritymajority" demography will evolve steadily toward the demographics of racial and ethnic pluralism at the local level. These developments will be accompanied by two important contrasting political possibilities: melting-pot assimilation or ethnic assertiveness. Increasingly, local jurisdictions will face an explicit choice based on what unifies a community and what distinguishes or divides its members. That choice must be made between the goal of ethnic and racial empowerment and the bonds of physical proximity that define common local interests.


200

NOTES 1 Variants of these settings are projected to become more commonplace, and on larger scales, in future decades. In 1990 only two of California's 58 counties had populations in which no single racial or ethnic group was the "majority." By 2010, 15 counties are expected to have this demographic quality, and California statewide will be a collection of "minorities." (See California Department of Finance 1993.) 2 Under cumulative voting, each voter may cast as many votes as there are seats to be filled-and may cast all votes for a single candidate. In the case of a residentially dispersed racial minority (e.g., Asians), individual minority voters could concentrate all three votes on a single candidate for one of three city council seats. 3 On this point see Skerry (1993), whose thesis is that current political institutions "are tutoring Mexican Americans to define themselves as a victimized group that cannot advance without the help of racially assigned benefits" (p. 7). 4 A legal challenge to North Carolina's 12th Congressional District was reviewed recently by the Supreme Court (Shaw v. Reno). The Court held that a state must demonstrate a "compelling interest" in drawing a bizarrely configured district in disregard of traditional redistricting criteria favoring compact and contiguous districts. 5 Holder v. Hall, Los Angeles Daily Journal, Daily Appellate Report, June 30, 1994; citations omitted. 6 Petit jury panels are selected from lists of registered voters and licensed drivers. 7 Only 40% of Alhambra's adult Asian/Pacific Islander population are citizens. The corresponding proportions of other groups are 65% of Hispanics, 82% of blacks, and 95% of Anglos. (Source: special tabulation of 1990 census data for Los Angeles County.) 8 The dilemma here is typical (see below for discussion of blacks intermingled with Hispanics in the City of EI Centro). Some situations, however, are entirely free of this dilemma. In Monterey County (CA), for example, areas of black, Asian, and Hispanic concentration overlapped so completely in 1990 that a district drawn to maximize one group would not dilute either of the other groups. Simply stated, when blacks are maximized in a district, Asians are very nearly maximized as well; when Asians are maximized in a district, blacks are very nearly maximized. In either instance. the concentration of Hispanics is unaffected.

REFERENCES Alonso, W. and P. Starr, eds. 1987. The Politics of Numbers. New York: Russell Sage Foundation. Avey, M.J. 1989. The Demobilization of the American Voter: A Comprehensive Theory of Voter Turnout. New York: Greenwood. Bean, F.D., B.J. Edmonston, and J.S. Passel. 1990. Undocumented Migration to the United States: IRCA and the Experience of the 1980s. Washington, DC: Urban Institute Press. Bean, F.D. and M. Fix. 1992. "The Significance of Recent Immigration Policy Reform in the Umted States." Pp. 41-55 in Nations of Immigrants: Australia. the United States. and International Migration, edited by G. Freeman and J. Jupp. Melbourne: Oxford University Press. Black, E. and M. Black. 1987. Politics and Society in the South. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Uruversity Press. Census of Population and Housing. 1990. California Department of Finance. 1993. Population Projections by RacelEthnicitv for California and Its Counties. 1990-2040, Report 93 P-l. Sacramento: California Department of Finance. Clark, W.A.V. and P.A. Morrison. 1992. Mirroring the Mosaic: Redistricting in the Context of Cultural Pluralism. Santa Monica: RAND. de la Garza, R.O. and L. DeSipio. 1993. "Save the Baby, Change the Bathwater, and Scrub the Tub: Latino Electoral Participation after Seventeen Years of Voting Rights Act Coverage." Texas Law Review 71:1479-1526. de la Garza, R.O., L. DeSipio, F.e. Garcia, J. Garcia, and A. Falcon. 1992. Latino Voices: Mexican, Puerto Rican. and Cuban Perspectives on American Politics. Boulder: Westview.


201

Edmonston, B.J. and J.S. Passel, eds. 1994. Immigration and Ethnicity: The Integration ofAmerica's Newest Arrivals. Washington, DC: Urban Institute. Espenshade, T. 1992. "Policy Influences on Undocumented Migration to the United States." Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 136:188-207. Fix, M. and J.S. Passel. 1994. Immigration and Immigrants: Setting the Record Straight. Washington, DC: Urban Institute. Flanigan, W. and N. Zingale. 1987. Political Behavior of the American Electorate. Boston: Allyn and Bacon. Gans, H. 1991. People, Plans and Policies: Essays on Racism and Other National Urban Problems. New York: Columbia University Press. Gartner, A. 1993. "Drawing the Lines: Redistricting and the Politics of Racial Succession in New York." Unpublished manuscript. Glazer, N. 1993. "Is Assimilation Dead?" Annals, American Association of Political and Social Science 530: 122-36. Grofman, B. 1985. "Criteria for Districting: A Social Science Perspective." UCLA Law Review 33:77-183. Guinier, L. 1993. "The Representation of Minority Interests: The Question of Single-Member Districts." Cardozo Law Review 14:1135-74. ___. 1994. The Tyranny of the Majority: Fundamental Fairness and Representative Democracy. New York: Free Press. Morrison, P.A. 1993. "Demographic Analysis of EI Centro Elementary School District." Unpublished manuscript. ___. 1994. "Empowered or Disadvantaged? Applications of Demographic Analysis to Political Redistricting." Pp. 17-32 in Demographics: A Casebook for Business and Government, edited by H.J. Kintner, T.W. Merrick, P.A. Morrison, and P.R. Voss. Boulder: Westview. Murphy, D.L. 1991a. "The Exclusion of Illegal Aliens from the Reapportionment Base: A Question of Representation." Case Western Reserve Law Review 41:969-97. ___. 1991b. "Garza v. County of Los Angeles: The Dilemma over Using Elector Population as Opposed to Total Population in Legislative Apportionment." Case Western Reserve Law Review 41:1013-28. O'Hare, W.P., K.M. Pollard, T.L. Mann, and M.M. Kent. 1991. "African Americans in the 1990s." Population Bulletin 46: I. Washington, DC: Population Reference Bureau. Portes, A. and M. Zhou. 1994. "Should Immigrants Assimilate?" The Public Interest 116 (Summer):18-33. Schlesinger, A.M., Jr. 1992. The Disuniting of America: Reflections on a Multicultural Society. New York: Norton. Shelley, F. 1994. "Geography, Territory, and Ethnicity: Current Perspectives from Political Geography." Urban Geography 15:189-200. Skerry, P. 1993. Mexican Americans: The Ambivalent Minority. New York: Free Press. Takaki, R. 1993. A Different Mirror: A History of Multicultural America. Boston: Little, Brown. Uhlaner, Ci.l., B.E. Cain, and D.R. Kiewiet. 1987. "Political Participation of Ethnic Minorities in the 1980s." Social Science Working Paper 647, Division of Humanities and Social Sciences, California Institute of Technology. Webster, Y.O. 1992. The Racialization of America. New York: St. Martin's. Wolfinger, R.E. and S.L Rosenstone. 1980. Who Votes? New Haven: Yale University Press.

CASES CITED Holder v. Hall U.S. 114 S.C!. 2581, 129 L.Ed 2d 687 (1994). Johnson v. De Grandy U.S. 114 S.C!. 2647, 129 L.Ed 2d 775 (1994). Shaw v. Reno U.S. 113 S.C!. 2816, 125 L.Ed 2d 511 (1993).