Volume 11, Issue 1 (1995) Latinos in a Changing Society, Part I

These two issues of the Journal focus exclusively on the Latino community in the United States, which is the fastest-growing minority in the country. It is a development that poses profound questions regarding the course this country will take into the twenty-first century and the way in which it will define itself. It will sever the almost metaphysical distinctions between the melting pot and multiculturalism, opposites on a philosophical curve that are as much self-created as self-evident.

Three areas of Latino experience are examined in this volume — the impact of immigration policies, employment and income opportunities, and the degree of political participation. The common denominator in all three is that the Latino experience is exceptional in comparison with the historical experience of other immigrant — or racial — groups, indeed, that in many ways it is antithetical to the experience of other groups and has many disturbing implications for the direction of public policy in these highlysensitive policy arenas, especially in times of severe economic difficulties.