Inventive politicians and ethnic ascent in American politics

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"This innovative book investigates the process through which ethnic minorities penetrate into higher echelons of political power: specifically, how they succeed in getting elected to the U.S. Congress. Analysts today see ethnic politicians largely in relation to their collectivities, but by actually studying what ethnic minority politicians do and the issues they have faced, Jimâenez's book offers an original perspective of analysis. Jiménez utilizes a ground-breaking comparative dataset of elected members of Congress organized upon the basis of national origin, the first available. Using the cases of Mexican-Americans and Italian-Americans, Jiménez analyzes and compares the different ways that these ethnic politicians have been elected to the national legislature from the beginning of the 20th century until the present. Her study examines Italian and Mexican-American politicians' actions and interactions with local political parties, identifies various layers of political power that have influenced their successes and failures, and uncovers the strategies that they have used." --