Immigrants, Intersectionality and the Politics of Substantive Representation

Abstract

In this paper, we develop a theory of intersectional substantive representation of and by immigrant communities grounded in two concepts: representational orientation to constituents and representational activity to achieve goals. We argue that Asian American women and Latinas are more likely than Latinos and Asian American men to hold an “embedded” orientation to politics, and view community networks and ties as deeply intertwined with the way they frame their identities and goals as representatives. We test our theoretical expectations regarding formal legislative processes by analyzing bill sponsorship by Asian American and Latina/o Democrats serving in state legislatures from 2014–2017, and draw on a set of interviews with Latina/o and Asian American legislators to argue that our findings account for a wider range of experiences related to overlapping group identities than previous scholarship focused on race and gender alone.