Editors’ Introduction

Abstract

If we had to pick a theme for this issue, we would emphasize the links between the past, present, and future of Black politics. The three featured articles honor the legacy of a giant in the study of race and politics, provide a current, dynamic vision for our parent organization (NCOBPS), and present some of the newest in Black politics scholarship.On March 13, 2021, the National Conference of Black Political Scientists (NCOBPS) inaugurated Dr. Tiffany Willoughby-Herard of the University of California, Irvine, as its forty-first president. As is customary in other organizations’ flagship journals, we are pleased to publish a written transcript of Dr. Willoughby-Herard’s remarks. We hope that this is the beginning of a venerable tradition in the National Review of Black Politics.In addition to hailing the present, we honor our past in this issue with a reflection on the scholarship of Lucius Jefferson Barker (1928–2020), the first editor of the National Political Science Review, our predecessor journal. Dr. Barker had a remarkable career as a scholar of public law and Black politics. As the article by Barker’s former student H.W. Perry shows, there were clear linkages between these two topics in Barker’s research. Indeed, Barker’s understanding of systemic racism informed his research on judicial politics, and his research on judicial politics informed his scholarship on Black politics.The final article looks forward, presenting new scholarship and upholding our mission to publish the best peer-reviewed scholarship on Black politics. In “Conceptualizing Black Political Disillusionment: Stories from New Orleans,” Marcus Coleman, Marek Steedman, Iliyan Iliev, and Lawless Turner discuss African American attitudes about racial solidarity in the 2010 mayoral election in New Orleans, which elected the city’s first white mayor (Mitch Landrieu) in more than thirty years. Read the article for its substance, but also note other features of this piece. First, the empirical findings for this article are based on qualitative data (focus groups). In the spirit of methodological pluralism, we believe that it is important to highlight our commitment to publishing all kinds of peer-reviewed scholarship on Black politics, regardless of method. Second, this article includes a nonacademic co-author, Lawless Turner (whose identity was not concealed to the reviewers—the academic authors were). Turner was the focus group moderator for the data collection. His collaborators rightfully give him credit as an equal co-author. We applaud the other co-authors for making this decision, which shows them to be true role models when it comes to producing ethical, community-engaged scholarship.Truly, it takes a community to produce this journal. We cannot publish it in a timely fashion without the support of the NCOBPS community. We are grateful to our NCOBPS leadership (Executive Director Kathie Stromile Golden, President Tiffany Willoughby-Herard, and Immediate Past President Sekou Franklin) for their undying support of the journal. And we thank you, NCOBPS members, for your support as well. We hope that you continue to invest in making this journal a success by submitting your articles, reviewing the work of others when asked, and citing work published here. These steps are essential to ensuring the success of the National Review of Black Politics.