Reexamining the “Politics of In-between”: Political Participation among Mexican Immigrants in the United States

Abstract

This article undertakes a multivariate analysis of political participation among Mexican American immigrants. Traditional forms of participation such as registration and voting are not adequate tests of civic engagement for a population including 7 million noncitizens. Rather, this article examines nonelectoral participation including attending a meeting or rally, volunteering for a campaign, or donating money to a political cause. This research employs a national sample of Mexican Americans, including immigrants and noncitizens, and the models reveal that Mexican American immigrants are politically active. The authors find that the foreign-born are not less likely to be active than native-born respondents and, furthermore, among the foreign-born, noncitizens are just as likely to participate as naturalized citizens. Although traditional SES variables remain important, language fluency, percentage of life in the United States, and immigrant attitudes toward opportunities in the United States contribute additional predictive capacity to models of political participation among Mexican immigrants.