Beyond Coethnic Boundaries: Coethnic Residential Context, Communication, and Asian Americans’ Political Participation

This study examines when and where residential context and communicative factors help and hurt Asian Americans’ political participation both within and beyond coethnic boundaries. Using multilevel analyses, this paper found that living in ethnically homogeneous residential areas and using ethnic media increase Asian-related political awareness. However, these coethnic features in their communicative structure did not directly bridge Asian communities to the political participation. Instead, coethnic features indirectly galvanize Asian Americans’ political participation, which may spill over to more general domains of political participation. Ethnic minorities’ participation in political processes is essential for a functioning democracy whose constituents consist of a variety of racial and ethnic origins. Recent conceptualization of multicultural democracy suggests ethnic minorities should be engaged in politics both as members of ‘‘large’’ general publics and ‘‘small’’ ethnically bounded publics. The large general publics address issues and concerns that face the whole population in a nation-state. The small publics articulate and advance group interests that could be neglected by the dominant ethnic groups (Jacobs & Tillie, 2004; Marri, 2003). Despite these normative expectations about minority-group participation, ethnic minorities have been reported to be less likely to engage in politics relative to dominant ethnic groups. In addition, studies found that existing theoretical models of political participation have not adequately explained this participation gap between the dominant and minority groups. Existing theories of ethnic minority participation lack consideration of an integrative communication aspect that might either facilitate or hinder ethnic All correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Mihye Seo, Room 331, Social Science Building, 1400 Washington Avenue, Albany, NY, 12222, USA. E-mail: mseo@albany.edu minorities’ participation in general and ethnic specific arenas. Political communication research has noted that communicative configuration and processes, both interpersonal and mediated, affect people’s political participation (Ball-Rokeach, Kim, & Matei, 2001; McLeod, Scheufele, & Moy, 1999). An ethnic civic community perspective also highlights key roles of communication in ethnic minority groups’ political participation. This perspective suggests that ‘‘communication fabrics’’ (Kim & Ball-Rokeach, 2006, p. 173) of ethnic community—communicative ties among and across ethnic group members and ethnic media use—affect the level of ethnic groups’ political participation and trust (Fennema, 2004; Fennema & Tillie, 1999; Jacobs & Tille, 2004). Concurring with the importance of the communicative approach to explain ethnic minorities’ political participation, this study is particularly interested in the Asian American population. Asian Americans are one of the fastest growing ethnic minorities in the United States, yet their level of political participation is not proportionate to their population growth (Lai, Cho, Kim, & Takeda, 2001; Tam, 1995). Their political participation level, as well as the number of political elites who represent them, is lower than that of other ethnic groups. Studies show that among situations where ethnic minority groups are not highly participatory, in spite of high social economic status (SES), Asian Americans are a typical example of this anomaly (e.g., Cain, Kiewiet, & Uhlaner, 1991; Tam, 1995). Therefore, using a sample of Asian Americans, this study examines the political implications of ethnically homogeneous residential areas and ethnic media reliance: Whether or not the coethnic features of communicative factors encourage or inhibit ethnic minorities’ political participation. Ethnic Minority and Political Participation The task of including ethnic minorities and their voices into the mainstream public sphere is a priority in most democratic societies. Theoretical models developed to explain general political participation have been tested in order to explicate ethnic minorities’ political participation. For instance, the most prominent and widely supported model of political participation is based on SES, which argues that higher status individuals, relative to lower status individuals, are more likely to have better tools enabling them to be politically engaged (Conway, 1991; Gimpel, Lay, & Schuknecht, 2003; Rosenstone & Hansen, 1993). In addition, those with higher SES are believed to obtain greater benefits from political involvement than those of lower status (Campbell, Converse, Miller, & Stokes, 1960; Key, 1964). While the general importance of SES for explaining participation is clear, SES is a less robust predictor for minority group political participation. In fact, the B E Y O N D C O E T H N I C B O U N D A R I E S 339