Hispanic Voting Related Literature Essay

The coming of the 2008 US Presidential Elections has made studies on right to suffrage conduct a fad in the scholastic community. Everybody wants to know, especi tout ensembley the views, how the States or segments of its population will vote or the chances that a candidate will win based on some observations on voter turn fall out patterns. Unfortunately, and non many people know this, studying suffrage expression is not as simple as looking at the choose statistics.As ace scholar commented, voting is among the acts hardest to explain (Uhlaner, 1989, p. 390). For one, Samuel Eldersveld (1951), defined voting manner to connote more than the examination of voting records, but too includes analyses on individual psychological processes and their relation to the vote-decision, of group structures and functions and their relation to semi semipolitical action, as well as institutional patterns and their impact on elections (Eldersveld, 1951, p. 71).Thus, studies on voting beha vior confuse as well become multi-disciplinary, and were never control in the field of political science. Still, studying voting behavior holds so much promise as far as theory kink is concerned, because it is viewed to be an argona where theory can be sy cannonatically and quantitatively measured and tested. Also, this area offers more valid and reliable submitments of causal determinants and a wealth of hypotheses, as voting behavior can be canvas with respect to several(prenominal) possible variables.(Eldersveld, 1951, pp. 72-73). In her emphasis on the component of groups, Carole Uhlaner hypothesizes that voters act as part of groups with shared interests (p. 390). Based on a utilitarian model of consumption benefit, she suggests that a group votes for a definite candidate because it would benefit from the policy positions of that candidate. From here, it is not difficult to presume that heathen groups vote for candidates coming from their own group because they are ex pected to fit their interests.Though there has been a debate, in the case of Hispanic elect Officials (HEOs), on whether Latino members of the US House of Representatives substantially represent the interests of their Hispanic constituents (Hero and Tolbert, 1995 and Kerr and Miller, 1997), it is useful to start with the assumption that groups, particularly pagan groups, play an of import role in determining voting behavior as identities and affiliations excise voters recitals of the political world, preferences, and actions. (Uhlaner, 1989)Thus, a very interesting, yet under-studied (Antunes and Gaitz, 1975 Hero, 1990 Arvizu and Garcia, 1996), subject of inquiry on voting behavior would be the Hispanics in the United States. Scholars and politicians alike are interested in finding out how Latinos vote because despite the change magnitude significance of the group, being the fastest growe minority group in the US (Tanneeru, 2007), there seems to be the absence of consisten t or foreseeable patterns on Hispanic voting across areas and through time. It may stem from the fact that the Hispanic community is diverse and voting interests are not homogenous.A Cuban-American may vote for a Republican because of the partys long-standing policies toward Cuba, while a Hispanic in a border state may be affected by the stringent immigration policies. The civilisation of a state can alike affect a Hispanic voters behavior Texas voters may be more mercenary in contrast to more liberal Hispanic voters in atomic number 20. A study on the impact of religion excessively revealed that first and third gear extensions placed more importance on religion than the second generation Hispanics in the US (Tanneeru, 2007).Socio-economic factors much(prenominal) as social class, occupation, poverty indicators, among others are also seen as significant determinants of voter turnout (Arvizu and Garcia, 1996 Antunes and Gaitz, 1975). In her interpretation of the Hispanic upset voter turnout, Cassel even suggested that Hispanics vote less than Anglos during presidential elections because they tend to be younger, less educated, poorer or less frequently contacted by a political party or candidate (Cassel, 2002, p. 397-398).In a comparison between the election of Federico Pena as Mayor of Denver, Colorado in 1983 and the bid of Victor Morales from Texas for US Senate in 1996 points to more variables that shaped the deuce campaigns. These include the size of the constituency, size and demographics of the Hispanic population, ability of the candidates to build coalitions of ethnic groups and sectors, personal qualifications or experience of the candidate, membership in civic organizations, political party support and campaign funds.This also tells us that the mere aim of a large Hispanic population in an electoral territorial dominion could not ascertain victory for a Hispanic candidate. In a study by Rodney Hero comparing Hispanic political behavior in two Colorado cities Denver and Pueblo with other California cities, it appears that the governmental structure plays a significant role in determining disparate levels of mobilisation of Hispanics in the cities.Colorado cities, with their unreformed structure, particularly Denver which has a strong-mayor system, have obtained greater political influence than what can be observed among California cities. This study supports the observation in 1983 in Denver, Colorado wherein Pena was elected into military position with the highest Hispanic voter turnout ever recorded in the city. It also proves that it is not always the case that Hispanics are politically acquiescent and politically inactive and/or ineffective.(Hero, 1990) The observed political apathy of Hispanics had been explained by several studies in different ways. A study on voting behavior in Texas from 1960-1970 asserts that discriminatory devices such as the poll tax, the requirement of annual adaptation, short re gistration periods, and length of time between the end of registration and general election had restricted qualified electorate in favor of unclouded persons and those with greater education and income (Shinn, 1971).Such means of discrimination, including literacy tests and printing of ballots in English, had also been used by the Mexican-American Legal Defense and Educational Fund (MALDEF), to go forward the take Rights Act of 1965 to include large jurisdictions where large Mexican American populations live. Arguing that Hispanics never really met the level of discrimination suffered by the blacks, for whom the select Rights Act was originally intended, Linda Chavez points out that Hispanic votes had been aggressively courted by presidential candidates since 1960s and that hundreds of Mexican Americans had held lieu since the 1970s.She contends that in places where Hispanics make up a large segment of the constituency, several other factors, not the absence of full seat for H ispanic representative, explain why no Hispanics hold office (Chavez, 1992). Complementing the initial observation of Chavez, George Antunes and Charels Gaitz found out in 1975 that in their interpretation of ethnic differences in the levels of confederation among blacks, Mexican-Americans and whites, ethnic identification process among minority groups only partially account for the higher level of political affair of the discriminated groups.However, they stressed that compared to blacks, Mexican-Americans have lower participation rates for golf-club of xi indicators of political participation, including voting. This is basically because of the cultural norms of participation inculcated in black communities owing to their history of discrimination wherein they suffered more than the Mexican-Americans (Antunes and Gaitz, 1975). policy-making history is also one of the aspects that Carol Cassel examined in her explanation of low Hispanic political participation as evident in the ir low voter turnout, compared to the African-Americans.Seeing that Hispanics vote at the same rate with other ethnic groups during presidential elections, Cassel suggests that low turnout in low visibility races can also be attributed to the Latinos lack of political networks or just because Latino political leaders prefer to mobilize voters in more competitive elections (Cassel, 2002). Mobilization efforts also figured as a very important determinant in the 1996 elections voting turnout in California, Florida and Texas (Shaw, dela Garza and Lee, 2000).Nevertheless, Harry Pachon and Louis De Sipio recognize that the structural changes such as the extension of the Voting Rights, combined with ethnic political mobilization in Latino communities and efforts of groups such as MALDEF, contributed to the increased electoral and political clout of the Hispanics. In their list of HEOs in the 1990s, they have found out that there were 4,004 Hispanics holding publicly-elected offices nationw ide 1% of the national total nine states accounting for 96% of HEOs in the US and that Hispanics were represented at all levels of government, except for the Presidency.The only factors that could mitigate the increasing trend of HEOs in the hobby years would be young Hispanic population and non-citizenship. (Pachon and De Sipio, 1992). Thus far, the many and variegated variables and determinants presented above attest that it is not easy to explain Hispanic voting behavior. Thus it is best to start with a single neck of the woods to test which of these or a combination of these variables could best explain Hispanic voting. (In this case, I have chosen to zero in on Houston, Texas, the fourth largest city in the United States.) Though in the process, I should be cautious against committing what Eldersveld warned with respect to generalizing from single cases. noneetheless, I believe that studies such as this could make a good case for comparing with similar political setting s, and eventually, in explaining Hispanic political behavior.ReferencesAntunes, G. and Gaitz, C. (1975) Ethnicity and Participation A Study of Mexican-Americans, Blacks and Whites. The American ledger of Sociology, Vol. 80, zero(prenominal) 5, 1192-1211. Arvizu, J. and Garcia, C. (1996) Latino Voting Participation Explaining and Differentiating Latino Voting Turnout.Hispanic Journal of Behavioral Sciences, Vol. 18, No. 2, 104-128. Cassel, C. (2002) Hispanic Turnout Estimates from formalize Voting Data. Political Research Quarterly, Vol. 55, No. 2, 391-408. Chavez, L. (1992) Hispanics, Affirmative Action and Voting. muniment of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, Vol. 523, 75-87. Dela Garza, R. , Lee, J. and Shaw, D. (2000) Examining Latino Turnout in 1996 A Three-State, Validated Survey Approach. American Journal of Political Science, Vol. 44, No. 2, 338-346. Eldersveld, S. J. (1951) Theory and Method in Voting Behavior Research. The Journal of Politics, Vol. 1 3, No.1, 70-87. Hero, R. (1990) Hispanics in Urban Government and Politics Some Findings, Comparisons and Implications. The Western Political Quarterly, Vol. 43, No. 2, 403-414. Hero, R. and Tolbert, C. (1995) Latinos and Substantive Representation in the US House of Representatives Direct, validating or Nonexistent? American Journal of Political Science, Vol. 39, No. 3, 640-652. Kerr, B. and Miller, W. (1997) Latino Representation, Its Direct and Indirect. American Journal of Political Science, Vol. 41, No. 3, 1066-1071. Pachon, H. and De Sipio, L. (1992) Latino Elected Officials in the 1990s. PS Political Science and Politics, Vol.25, No. 2, 212-217. Shinn, A. (1971) A Note on Voter Registration and Turnout in Texas, 1960-1970. The Journal of Politics, Vol. 33, No. 4, 1120-1129. Southwestern Social Science Association. (1997, March 27) The Victor Morales for US Senate Campaign Did the Sleeping Giant Notice an Unusual Campaign? Tanneeru, M. (2007, folk 28). Inside the Hispanic Vo te Growing in Numbers, Growing in Diversity. Retrieved from http//www. cnn. com/2007/US/09/28/hispanic. vote/index. html Uhlaner, C. J. (1989) Rational Turnout The unheeded Role of Groups. 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