The Search for a Civic Voice: California Latino Politics – Book Review

The role of Hispanics in American politics has garnered the attention of various interlocutors now that they’ve passed African-Americans as the nation’s largest minority. As a group, Hispanics are perhaps the most complex and diverse of any “minority,” defying even national origin as a common denominator. Though Mr. Burt uses the all encompassing term “Latino” as part of his title and throughout his discourse, the book more accurately reflects the evolution of political power of Mexican Americans in California. Citizens of Mexican origin, after all, have continuously inhabited California since the Spanish Colonial period, and the Hispanic presence in California has been and continues to be predominately of Mexican origin.

Written in a lucid, non-academic style, The Search for a Civic Voice is a refreshing throwback to when histories were not only meant to be informative but dramatic and entertaining. It far exceeds its promise to be a compilation of political “firsts.” It offers a non-partisan and almost self-consciously neutral presentation of the evolution of the Hispanic electorate from 1939 to the election of Antonio Villaraigosa as Mayor of Los Angeles in 2005.”*

*From: www.californiaprogressreport.com
Traducido: usando Google o Altavista/Babel Fish

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