Strengthening Efforts to Engage the Hispanic Community in Citizen‐Driven Governance: An Assessment of Efforts in Utah

• Date: 01 March 2011
• Author: Patria de Lancer Julnes,Derek Johnson
• Published date: 01 March 2011
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-6210.2011.02333.x

Spotlight

on Critical

Grassroots Public

Administration

Issues

Patria de Lancer Julnes is an associ-

ate professor and director of the doctor

of public administration program in the

School of Public Affairs at the University of

Baltimore. Her research interests include

government accountability and perform-

ance, citizen participation, and government

reform. She is a past co-chair of ASPA’s

Center for Accountability and Performance.

E-mail: pjulnes@ubalt.edu

Derek Johnson holds a master of

science in political science from Utah

State University. He currently works for a

nonprof‌i t organization in Washington, D.C.

His research interests include philanthropy,

nonprof‌i t management, and performance

management.

E-mail: derekjohnson@gmail.com

Strengthening Efforts to Engage the Hispanic Community 221

Patria de Lancer Julnes

University of Baltimore

Derek Johnson

How can the Hispanic community in Utah strengthen

its active engagement in government? Interviews by the

authors with key government and community-based

organization representatives of‌f er evidence on (1) who

is being engaged in the Hispanic community, (2) what

are the barriers to engagement, and (3) which modes

of engagement are likely to be ef‌f ective and under what

conditions. Findings indicate that only a small elite in

the Hispanic community is currently involved. Even

for the elite, engagement is fairly superf‌i cial. Historical

patterns characterize the Hispanic community limited

interaction.  e peculiar nature of Utah government

also reduces their participation.

Pragmatic lessons are drawn

to enhance substantially

improved partnerships, build

comprehensive action plans,

and strengthen government

commitment to civic inclusion

that transcend Utah and apply

to diverse minority communities

everywhere.

Hispanics constitute

the fastest-growing

minority popula-

tion in the United States. As

of 2000, they had become

the nation’s largest minor-

ity group, and by 2007, the

Hispanic population had

reached 45 million, surpassing the African Ameri-

can population by more than 4 million (Suro 2002;

U.S. Census Bureau 2008). Remarkably, much of

the recent Hispanic population growth has occurred

in areas of the country with historically smaller and

more homogenous population bases, such as the

South, Midwest, and Intermountain West (Guzmán

2001; Kandel and Cromartie 2004).  us, govern-

ments in these areas are faced with new challenges

of understanding and responding to the needs

of a culturally and linguistically diverse group of

citizens.

One way of addressing these challenges, long ad-

vocated by scholars and administrators, is through

citizen-driven governance—the inclusion of citizens in

the policy development and decision-making process

(Schachter 1995). Citizen-driven governance requires

that elected of‌f‌i cials and administrators share decision-

making authority with citizens, which can lead to

greater trust and increased government responsiveness

to citizens’ needs.

While research has been conducted on citizen-driven

governance, little work has been done to examine the

roles that Hispanics and other ra-

cial and ethnic minority groups

are playing in the governance

process.  is research begins to

address this gap by analyzing

the ef‌f orts that government in

Utah is making to engage the

Hispanic community. Specif‌i -

cally, we examine who is being

engaged among Hispanics, the

modes of engagement that are

being used, and the barriers to

engaging this community within

the context of the policy areas of

interest to the Hispanic commu-

nity in Utah.  e f‌i ndings of this

research hold promise not only

for improving the engagement

of Hispanic communities across

the country, but also for informing theories of citizen-

driven governance for the multicultural society that the

United States continues to become.

To understand our results, two issues need to be

noted. First, in order for the Hispanic community to

have meaningful input into Utah governance, more

is required than simply encouraging people from that

group to vote. On this point, consider the popula-

tion estimates from the 2007 American Community

Survey reported by the Pew Hispanic Center (2009),

which indicate that most Hispanics in Utah are not

Strengthening Ef‌f orts to Engage the Hispanic Community in

Citizen-Driven Governance: An Assessment of Ef‌f orts in Utah

While research has been

conducted on citizen-driven

governance, little work has

been done to examine the

roles that Hispanics and other

racial and ethnic minority

groups are playing in the

governance process. This

research begins to address this

gap by analyzing the efforts

that government in Utah is

making to engage the Hispanic

community.