Institute for the Study of Societal Issues

In spite of having relatively high levels of educational and occupational attainment and income, and having the highest rates of naturalization among immigrant populations, Asian Americans have the lowest rates of electoral participation of any racialized group in the United States. This paradoxical combination defies both traditional political science theories of political engagement, which emphasize socioeconomic determinants of participation, and conventional sociological theories of assimilation, which view political integration as occurring in step with socioeconomic integration. In this paper, I argue that local-level political-contextual conditions are an important contributor to Asian American under-participation in electoral politics. In particular, I reveal that while there are substantial differences in the net size of the Asian-white voter registration gap across states, even more dramatic differences exist across counties within the same state. I further demonstrate that this variation cannot be explained by differences in the size, density, or ethnic and immigrant composition of the Asian American population across counties, which suggests that the county contexts themselves are driving the differences. The findings in this research indicate a need for comparative studies across local contexts.