Faces of Inequality Social Diversity in American Politics

by Hero, Rodney E.

• ISBN13: 9780195117141
• ISBN10: 019511714X
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 1998-07-30
• Publisher: Oxford University Press

Summary

The distinctive thesis of Faces of Inequality is that a state's racial and ethnic composition, as much as any other factor, shapes its political processes and policies. To understand state politics, therefore, we must consider them from the perspective of social diversity. Scholars havebroadly acknowledged that racial and ethnic diversity are central to American political history, but Rodney E. Hero is the first to posit and systematically examine this diversity as essential to our understanding of contemporary American politics. In these pages, Hero regards race/ethnicity as an American "dilemma" whose importance transcends state boundaries, yet whose impact upon U.S. politics varies widely. He classifies states' social diversity patterns as homogenous, heterogeneous, or bifurcated, and demonstrates how these patternsinfluence political tendencies. Social diversity, he finds, is strongly related not only to political processes, but also to specific policies and outcomes, such as educational policies, incarceration rates, and infant mortality. Hero's interpretation provides a new way of looking at state politics,one that causes us to broadly rethink U.S. politics from the standpoint of social diversity. A bold interpretation of the American political experience (especially at the state level) that is as challenging as it is timely, Faces of Inequality will be of interest to all students of race and politics in contemporary America.

Author Biography

Rodney E. Hero is Professor of Political Science at the University of Colorado at Boulder. He is also the author of Latinos and the U.S. Political System (1992), which won the American Political Science Association's Ralph Bunche Award for 1993.

Table of Contents

1 Social Diversity and the Study of State Politics and Policy	3	(22)
2 The Social Diversity Interpretation in Perspective: Reviewing Other Explanations of State Politics	25	(18)
3 Social Diversity and Political Institutions, Political Processes, and Attitudes	43	(24)
4 Social Diversity and the Formal Institutions of State Government	67	(18)
5 Social Diversity and State Public Policies: Education, Health, and Welfare	85	(20)
6 Social Diversity and State Public Policies: Other Issues	105	(16)
7 Social Diversity at the Substate Level	121	(18)
8 The Social Diversity Interpretation of State Politics and Policy in Perspective	139	(16)
Notes	155	(24)
References	179	(10)
Index	189