Abstract
Studies on centralization and its effect on political empowerment among racial minorities suggest that decentralized arrangements are optimal for increasing empowerment. However, this article argues that the “decentralization-as-optimal” perspective ignores the complicated history that racial minorities have had with government. To assess the effects of centralized government on political empowerment among racial minorities, this article examines how state takeovers of local school districts have affected black and Latino descriptive representation on local school boards. Using an original dataset of state takeovers of local school districts from 1989 to 2013, as well as case study analysis of Newark, New Jersey, this article shows that centralization affects communities differently according to the level of political empowerment they have at the time of centralization.
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