The Latina Advantage
Gender, Race, and Political Success
Publication Year: 2013
Published by: University of Texas Press

Acknowledgments
I would like to thank Gary Segura for continuing to serve as an in-valuable advisor to me since graduate school. I am thankful for Valerie Martinez-Ebers, who has always encouraged me to pursue my goals as a scholar. I express thanks to the University of Iowa faculty who served on my dissertation committee: Douglas Dion, David Redlawsk, Vicki ...

Introduction. Challenges to the Double Disadvantage Theory
The political landscape of the 2008 presidential election, with Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton as major party candidates for president, highlighted a number of important issues concerning the impact of race and gender. Questions arose regarding the predicted level of voter support for women and racial/ethnic-minority political candidates. Would a black or a female presidential candidate be electable in ...
Part I. Attitudinal Advantages for Latinas

1. Gender and Racial Attitudes in Politics
Voter bias is an influential dynamic that has the potential to impede the electoral success of both women and minorities in the United States. Previous researchers have focused their analysis of voter bias and political disadvantages on either women or, separately, racial/ethnic minorities. Bias can also have an interactive infl uence, with gender ...

2. Positive Interaction of Gender and Race/Ethnicity
Gender and racial/ethnic identity are key factors that can influence public support of different kinds of political incumbents. Members of the public are expected to positively view their legislative incumbent when they share the same descriptive characteristics (gender and/or race/ethnicity). They are also expected to regard their legislative incumbent ...
Part II. Political and Electoral Advantages for Latinas

3. Predicting Latina Political Office-holding
This section tackles a new set of questions as a means of evaluating the electoral advantages that Latinas hold in terms of state political environment and candidate-quality characteristics, including an investigation of the state-level factors that can infl uence Latina political offi ceholding across the country. What type of electoral districts do Latina ...

4. Diverse State Legislators in Texas
The minority population in Texas has dramatically increased in the last thirty years. Between the 2000 and the 2010 Census, the Latino population grew from 6.7 million to 9.5 million (42 percent), and this increase accounted for nearly two-thirds (65 percent) of the state’s total population growth (NALEO 2010e). Since the 1960s, the minority population has been able ...

5. Diverse State Legislators in California
Between the 2000 and 2010 Census, the Latino population in California grew from 11.0 million to 14.0 million (an increase of 27.8 percent), and this “accounted for almost all of the state’s population growth” during that decade (NALEO 2010b). California also has the second- highest number of Latino elected officials in the country, such as the total of ...

Conclusion. Explanations for Latina Political Success
This analysis set out to explain the ongoing success of Latinas in U.S. politics. Minority women have made signifi cant strides in the last ten years, surpassing the expectations and explanations of political scientists. During the late 1990s, minority women made up significant proportions of their respective minority delegations in the national and ...
E-ISBN-13: 9780292745650
E-ISBN-10: 0292745656
Print-ISBN-13: 9780292745643
Print-ISBN-10: 0292745648
Page Count: 195
Illustrations: 9 charts/graphs, 47 tables
Publication Year: 2013
OCLC Number: 852158396
MUSE Marc Record: Download for The Latina Advantage