Black Politics in a Time of Transition
THE NATIONAL POLITICAL SCIENCE REVIEW
EDITORS
Michael Mitchell
Arizona State University
David Covin
California State University-Sacramento
BOOK REVIEW EDITOR
Tiffany Willoughby-Herard
University of California-Irvine
EDITORIAL BOARD
Georgia Persons
Georgia Institute of Technology
Robert Smith
San Francisco State University
Duchess Harris
Macalester University
Cheryl M. Miller
University of Maryland-Baltimore
County
Lorenzo Morris
Howard University
Todd Shaw
University of South Carolina
K.C. Morrison
Mississippi State University
Melissa Nobles
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Lisa Aubrey
Arizona State University
Black Politics in a Time of Transition
National Political Science Review, Volume 13
Michael Mitchell David Covin, editors
A Publication of the National Conference of Black Political Scientists
First published 2012 by Transaction Publishers
Published 2017 by Routledge
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Copyright 2012 by Taylor & Francis.
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Library of Congress Catalog Number: 2011017766
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Black politics in a time of transition / Michael Mitchell and David Covin, editors.
p. cm. (National political science review; v. 13)
ISBN 978-1-4128-4268-6
1. African AmericansPolitics and government20th century. 2. African AmericansPolitics and government21st century. 3. African American leadershipHistory20th century. 4. African American leadershipHistory21st century. 5. African American politiciansHistory20th century. 6. African American politiciansHistory21st century. I. Mitchell, Michael. II. Covin, David, 1940-
E185.615.B54663 2011
323.11960730905dc23
2011017766
ISBN 13: 978-1-4128-4268-6 (pbk)
Contents
Katherine Tate
Nikol Alexander-Floyd
Gladys Mitchell-Walthour
Mack H. Jones
Rutledge Dennis
William Strickland
Michael Mitchell and David Covin
Ronald Walters
Robert C. Smith
Katherine Tate
Minion K. C. Morrison
Tiffany Willoughby-Herard
reviewed by Clyde Woods
reviewed by Major Coleman
reviewed by Barrington S. Edwards
reviewed by Troy Jackson
reviewed by Michael Tran
reviewed by John A. Tures
reviewed by Erica R. Edwards
reviewed by Amrah Salomn Johnson
reviewed by Zahra Ahmed
Joseph P. McCormick II
This issue of the National Political Science Review (NPSR) marks a transition in its editorial leadership. For the past twelve years, Professor Georgia Persons has guided the NPSR through a variety of circumstances in a manner that has preserved its rigorous professional standards. Under her stewardship the NPSR has distinguished itself in the publication of articles of timely interest and high scholarly quality. In addition, Professor Persons has enriched the NPSR with special issues such as the Race and Democracy in the Americas, that have broadened the reach of our discussion of what is called Black Politics. Sustaining the high professionalism and intellectual reach of the NPSR is the challenge she has handed to the new editorial team.
Part of this challenge is making the journal one that is read widely throughout political science discipline and one which elected officials and activists regard as a place for following debates on the unfolding trends in the area of race and politics. The editors will cast the net widely in soliciting contributions from a broad reach of the discipline. Mindful of the particular interests of our readership, we will also look for special topics as themes for organizing particular issues of the journal.
This issue contains a couple of innovative features. We introduce a section called Works in Progress. It will be devoted to the comments of selected scholars whom we invite to offer reflections on the research they are presently engaged in or work which they have recently completed. Our aim is to offer space wherein scholars speak somewhat intimately about the reasons for choosing the research projects which occupy so much of their attention. We have asked them to write in a more personal vein as a way of telling their peers about those motivations that guide their professional lives. We include four essays to inaugurate this section, one of which is a posthumous commentary by a longstanding supporter of both the NPSR and of National Conference of Black Political Scientists (NCOBPS). Its inclusion is a way for us to honor the memory of our friend, Professor Ronald Walters.
In addition to the finished pieces selected through the blind review process, we also wish to highlight papers presented at a recent meeting of NCOBPS. It is our belief that a scholarly journal should be a multifaceted platform for disseminating research. First and foremost, it serves to bring to the attention of a scholarly audience, research of a finished quality. It may also serve, however, to capture the evolving or ongoing nature of a research enterprise. In this light we want the NPSR to reflect the dynamism of research as an extended, stage by stage, process. To do this, we will focus on the labors brought to the annual meeting of NCOBPS. We will select a panel that seems to have the broadest possible appeal or which appears to have a place in building the store of accumulated knowledge on race and politics. We will ask the participants of a selected panel to revise their papers in a manner meeting the editorial standards for publication in the NPSR.
Over the course of its more than forty-year existence, NCOBPS has witnessed tremendous changes in the ways in which scholars approach the topics of Black and minority politics. In this issue we provide our readers with a measure of that change with the publication of a document by Joseph McCormick II, a former NCOBPS president, detailing the early history of NCOBPS. We publish Professor McCormicks article in what we hope will become an occasional series called, From the NCOBPS Archive.
Book reviews are an essential feature of a scholarly journal. They provide the locus for introducing the latest in the disciplines research. It alerts readers to the topics regarded as timely and significant, as well as trends capturing attention, analysis, and debate. We therefore wish to make the Book Review Section as expansive as we can. Our reviews will be more than brief syntheses. Tiffany Willoughby-Herad, our book review editor, will charge reviewers with doing reviews that are critical, fair, and full throated. We also wish to extend the reach of our reviewers so that we can establish a community of concerned practitioners which radiates out from NCOBPS to include experts of all stripes and experiences.