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Aoki, A. L.; Nakanishi, D. T.: Asian Pacific Americans and the new minority politics. - S. 605-610. Lai, J. S.; Tam Cho, W. K.; Kim, T. P.; Takeda, O.: Asian-Pacific-American campaigns, elections, and elected officials. - S. 611-618. Geron, K.; Cruz, E. de la; Saito, L. T.; Singh, J.: Asian Pacific American's social movements and interest groups, S. 619-624. Pei-te Lien; Collet, C.; Wong, J.; Ramakrishnan, S. K.: Asian Pacific-American public opinion and political participation. - S. 625-630. Kim, C. J.; Lee, T.: Interracial politics: Asian American and other communities of color, S. 631-637. Watanabe, P. Y.: Global forces, foreign policy, and Asian Pacific Americans, S. 639-644

The Voting Rights Act (VRA) is one of the most important—if not
the most important—public policies developed
over the last half century to increase access to the U.S. political
system for people of color. The VRA also provides an important
context for understanding the ascension of nonwhite groups into the
elected leadership of the nation (Browning, Marshall, and Tabb 1984; Davidson and Grofman 1994; Menifield 2001; McClain and Stewart 2002; Segura and Bowler 2005;
Bositis 2006). This essay assesses the
present-day significance of the VRA for the political representation
of communities of color by examining the implications of
majority-minority districts and other key provisions in the VRA for
the election of nonwhite officials in the beginning years of the
twenty-first century.

This research draws on the nation's first comprehensive database of elected leadership of color to provide a multi-cultural, multi-office, and multi-state look at the contours and context of descriptive representation by race and gender and with women of color at the center of analysis. We find that key to the persistent trend of growth in elective office holding of the nation's Black, Latino, and Asian American communities in recent decades is the expanding size of women of color elected officials. Compared to whites, gender gaps in descriptive representation are smaller among nonwhite groups. Although the proportion of nonwhite population may impact the degree of electoral success, we find parity ratios to vary by race, gender, level of office, and state. For example, states that have the highest share of the black population did not produce the highest level of representation of Black women. Finally, we find that gender differences within each race are generally significant, but far greater racial differences are found among men and women of color elected officials-especially at the municipal and school board levels of offices. We conclude that women of color have played a significant role in advancing descriptive political representation of people of color and of women in the United States as a whole. Adapted from the source document. COPIES ARE AVAILABLE FROM: HAWORTH DOCUMENT DELIVERY CENTER, The Haworth Press, Inc., 10 Alice Street, Binghamton, NY 13904-1580