Immigrants and Electoral Politics by
In Immigrants and Electoral Politics, Heath Brown shows why nonprofit electoral participation has emerged in relationship to new threats to immigrants, on one hand, and immigrant integration into U.S. society during a time of demographic change, on the other. Immigrants across the United States tend to register and vote at low rates, thereby limiting the political power of many of their communities. In an attempt to boost electoral participation through mobilization, some nonprofits adopt multifaceted political strategies including registering new voters, holding candidate forums, and phone banking to increase immigrant voter turnout. Other nonprofits opt to barely participate at all in electoral politics, preferring to advance the immigrant community by providing exclusively social services.Brown interviewed dozens of nonprofit leaders and surveyed hundreds of organizations. To capture the breadth of the immigrant experience, Brown selected organizations operating in traditional centers of immigration as well as new gateways for immigrants across the South: Florida, Illinois, Michigan, New Jersey, New York, and, North Carolina. The stories that emerge from his research include incredible successes in mobilizing immigrant communities, including organizations that registered sixty thousand new immigrant voters in New York. They also reveal efforts to suppress nonprofit voter mobilization in Florida and describe the organizational response to hate crimes directed at immigrants in Illinois.
ISBN: 9781501705922Publication Date: 2016-08-31
Transforming Politics, Transforming America by
Over the past four decades, the foreign-born population in the United States has nearly tripled, from about 10 million in 1965 to more than 30 million today. This wave of new Americans comes in disproportionately large numbers from Latin America and Asia, a pattern that is likely to continue in this century. In Transforming Politics, Transforming America, editors Taeku Lee, S. Karthick Ramakrishnan, and Ricardo Ramírez bring together the newest work of prominent scholars in the field of immigrant political incorporation to provide the first comprehensive look at the political behavior of immigrants.Focusing on the period from 1965 to the year 2020, this volume tackles the fundamental yet relatively neglected questions, What is the meaning of citizenship, and what is its political relevance? How are immigrants changing our notions of racial and ethnic categorization? How is immigration transforming our understanding of mobilization, participation, and political assimilation? With an emphasis on research that brings innovative theory, quantitative methods, and systematic data to bear on such questions, this volume presents a provocative evidence-based examination of the consequences that these demographic changes might have for the contemporary politics of the United States as well as for the concerns, categories, and conceptual frameworks we use to study race relations and ethnic politics. Contributors Bruce Cain (University of California, Berkeley) * Grace Cho (University of Michigan) * Jack Citrin (University of California, Berkeley) * Louis DeSipio (University of California, Irvine) * Brendan Doherty (University of California, Berkeley) * Lisa García Bedolla (University of California, Irvine) * Zoltan Hajnal (University of California, San Diego) * Jennifer Holdaway (Social Science Research Council) * Jane Junn (Rutgers University) * Philip Kasinitz (City University of New York) * Taeku Lee (University of California, Berkeley) * John Mollenkopf (City University of New York) * Tatishe Mavovosi Nteta (University of California, Berkeley) * Kathryn Pearson (University of Minnesota) * Kenneth Prewitt (Columbia University) * S. Karthick Ramakrishnan (University of California, Riverside) * Ricardo Ramírez (University of Southern California) * Mary Waters (Harvard University) * Cara Wong (University of Michigan) * Janelle Wong (University of Southern California)
ISBN: 9780813934204Publication Date: 2012-10-05
Noncitizen Voting and American Democracy by
Continuing large-scale migration to the United States raises the question of how best to integrate new immigrants into the American national community. Traditionally, one successful answer has been to encourage immigrants to learn our language, culture, history, and civic traditions. New immigrants would then be invited become citizens and welcomed as full members of the community. However, a concerted effort is underway to gain acceptance for, and implement, the idea that the United States should allow new immigrants to vote without becoming citizens. It is mounted by an alliance that brings together progressive academics, law professors, local and state political leaders, and community activists, all working to decouple voting from American citizenship. Their effort show signs of success, but is it really in America's best interests to allow new immigrants to have the vote? Their proposals have been much advocated, but little analyzed. Neither a polemic nor a whitewash, Stanley A. Renshon provides a careful analysis of the arguments put forward by advocates of this position on the basis of fairness, increasing democracy, civic learning, and moral necessity and asks: Do they really help immigrants become Americans?
ISBN: 9781442200043
Citizen Convicts by
Prisoner enfranchisement remains one of the few contested electoral issues in twenty-first-century democracies. It is at the intersection of punishment and representative government. Many jurisdictions remain divided on whether or not prisoners should be allowed access to the franchise. This book investigates the experience of prisoner enfranchisement in the Republic of Ireland. It examines the issue in a comparative context, beginning by locating prisoner enfranchisement in a theoretical framework, exploring the arguments for and against allowing prisoners to vote. Drawing on global developments in jurisprudence and penal policy, it examines the background to, and wider significance of, this change in the law. Using the Irish experience to examine the issue in a wider context, this book argues that the legal position concerning the voting rights of the imprisoned reveals wider historical, political and social influences in the treatment of those confined in penal institutions.
ISBN: 9781526101723Publication Date: 2016-09-15
Barriers to Voting
The path to voting is significantly difficult for certain demographics
Explore the tabs below to learn more...
Rights of U.S. Territory Residents
- Excluding American Samoans, residents of U.S. territories are U.S. citizens
- They can enroll in the military
- However...
- Unless they move to the mainland, they do not have the right to vote in a presidential election
- American Samoans
- In order to vote, they would need to complete the complex immigration and naturalization process before moving to the mainland
Explore some of the library's journal articles below:
Non-Citizens' Voting Rights:
- Due to voting fraud concerns, the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act was passed in 1996
- Placed tight restrictions on non-Citizens' right to vote (despite any intention of gaining legal citizenship)
- To gain the right to vote, non-citizens must
- Establish residency in the U.S. (live here for five years)
- Apply for citizenship (lengthy process / citizenship is not guaranteed)
- As a Naturalized Citizen, they can then vote
- Permanent Residents (not citizens, but granted the right to live & work in the U.S. with a "Green Card")
- Not permitted to vote in federal elections
- Voting or registering to vote could result in deportation
- Some states/cities allow non-citizens to vote in local and state elections
Explore some of the library's journal articles below:
Voting Rights of Felons:
- The voting rights of felons are decided on a state-to-state basis
- People serving a felony sentence may lose their right to vote
- People with felony histories may not have their right to vote restored, even after completing parole or probation
Explore some of the library's journal articles below:
Mental Disabilities and Voting Rights:
- Citizens with mental disabilities are sometimes disenfranchised during the voting process
- This often stems from voting fraud concerns
- No standard for assessing a person's mental ability to vote exists
- In some states, judges have the ability to rid people with mental disabilities of their right to vote
- Without an approved means of assessing people's mental ability to vote, citizens with disabilities may unjustly lose their voting rights
Explore some of the library's journal articles below:
Homelessness: Barriers to Voting
- Homeless people can vote
- However...
- The process of registering to vote is difficult and may seem intimidating and inaccessible
- Most states' voter registration policies require a
- Mailing address
- The option exists to list any address that is willing to accept mail on behalf of the voter (i.e. shelter)
- State-issued ID
- There are alternative options if a person does not have an ID. But the process may be quite difficult for a homeless citizen
- Mailing address
Explore some of the resources below:
Image Reference:
Robert Couse-Baker (Creator). i voted today [Photograph: licensed under CC BY 2.0]. Retrieved from https://search.creativecommons.org/photos/63f0e6a0-f6e5-4ffb-82b6-73773ae0aea7
