Democrats will not take such challenges lying down. They can point to an undeniably better record on such minority issues as civil rights, immigration, redress for Japanese American internees, equal employment opportunities and healthcare.
But the party realises it can hardly rest on its laurels. Maeley Tom, a Chinese American and dean of California legislative aides, now sits on the executive committee of the Democratic National Committee. The party also recruited a prominent activist from the Organisation of Chinese Americans to handle its Asian American outreach programme. State assembly candidate Lon Hatamiya got some campaign help from the Democrats in his unsuccessful bid in last month s elections to become California s first Asian American legislator.
California is shaping up as a crucial battleground, both for the national parties and for Asian American aspirations. After the 1990 census results are in, the state will gain seven or eight Congressional seats through reapportionment and redistricting. Given the tenacity of congressional incumbents, the best hope for
increased Asian American representation would seem to be creating new districts where they would have an easier time getting elected.
That means targeting areas with high concentrations of Asian American voters and guarding against dilution by other groups. The deadline is fast approaching for specific district line proposals to the state legislature.
Some Asian American groups have already identified two or three possible districts where a third of the population would be ethnically Asian. In the redistricting that followed the 1980 census, Blacks and Hispanics made benchmark gains. Asian Americans now want the same, but in the process, they could clash with other minorities  interests and stir up communal tensions.
The dilemma underscores the delicacy of the balancing act of US ethnic politics for Asian American candidates. It is seldom enough to appeal only to one s own ethnic group for support, particularly for higher level offices with larger constituencies where voters of any particular Asian ancestry cannot account for more than a few percent of the total.
27. Spicier Melting Pot
The next best thing is to seek the support of other Asian American groups. But even the block support of all Asian Americans would not be enough to carry the day in most cases.  You just can t win as an Asian candidate  per se, says Hatamiya. In his northern California district of rich farmers, for instance, Asian Americans accounted for only 2% of the votes. Most of the rest were Whites.
Nevertheless, ethnic Asian candidates will continue to play to the Asian American galleries, if for no other reason than to secure the generous campaign finance they provide. At the same time, Asian American politicians must transcend parochial interest to get elected. And once in office, they must attend to the concerns of the different groups which put them there. Too much focus on Asian American causes will earn the ire of nonAsian American supporters, and vice versa.
The answer, says Furutani, is to  bust a gut  and try to satisfy all groups. Scrupulously pursued, this approach could nurture Asian American politicians as truly national, rather than parochial, leaders.
Agreeing on agenda
Rallying point or stumbling block
If Asian Americans are to emerge as a political force, they will need to nurture common concerns around which to rally. Some existing issues have been natural meeting grounds for diverse ian American groups. Others are potentially divisive.
But, to gain political clout, Asian encan groups know they must trade t;n Ur^ W'^ each  ^er and build coali-d there is already evidence that Am are  astering these political arts. Am.ng top 'ssues on the Asian ^ncan agenda are:
'nter^ed88;/0' Japanese Americans World WarTiM31 0" Camps during cans h,, I*' ^t only Asian Ameri-rishts n eVen and Hispanic civil becauseu^ ra^ed around this question Sent it a e Japanese were able to pre-dnP 3 ^^hitional issue of bypass* Anti-Ar CeSS f ^aw on rac al grounds, typified klan. v* lence and hate crimes, Chin a	murder of Vincent
  mese American, in Detroit.
l\vo white auto plant workers, mistaking Chin for a Japanese, vented their frustration about die plight of the US auto industry by bludgeoning him to death with a baseball bat. Asian Americans, outraged by what it saw as lenient punishment, sought heavier sanctions against the murderers.
National attention has also focused on the boycott of Korean American shopowners by New York City Blacks. Less publicized cases of verbal harassment, vandalism, arson, beatings and killings fill the columns of Asian American newspapers. And things could get worse as recession sets in and the public mood grows uglier. Prodded by Asian American and other minority groups, Congress passed a Hate Crimes Statistics Act this year, requiring the Justice Department to track racially motivated crimes.
 	Immigration curbs on Asians is something that all Asian American groups can readily unite against. In the debate leading to the recent passage of the 1990 immigration act, mainstream politicians
tried to bridle the tide of Asian and Hispanic arrivals by reviewing the immigration privileges of relatives of naturalised US citizens. Asian American groups, mainly led by Chinese Americans, made common cause with Jews and Mexicans to keep family-based immigration opportunities open.
 	Job discrimination for Asian American professionals takes the form of a  glass railing  an invisible barrier that keeps them from ever reaching the topmost rungs of the corporate or social ladder. Studies also suggest that, adjusting for occupation and industry, highly educated, US-born Asian American males earn less than similarly qualified white men.
 Glass ceilings  are, by definition, hard to legislate against. But, at least, measures now before Congress would minimise discrimination against foreign-trained doctors (of whom there are many from India).
Thanks to legal victories in the 1970s, Asian Americans are entitled to  affir-
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5. ASIAN AMERICANS
mative action  benefits preferential hiring by such employers as police forces, the media and trade unions where they were adjudged to be under-represented. They are also eligible, as minorities and small businessmen, for  affirmative action  quotas in government procurement.
Getting the traditionally reticent Asians to use the quotas they are entitled to is another matter, but Asian American activists are now taking up the theme. Even
the independent Equal Employment Opportunity Commission now includes an Indian American appointee.
 	Education is an issue with more divisive potential. Some groups are battling racial college admission ceilings designed to prevent Asian American  overrepresentation,  while others seek preferential  affirmative action  access to schools.
High achievers advocate a strict merit
system on the grounds tha the only way to beat sociel tion. But some groups   advantaged Filipino anc students at some Califon for instance find it doubl excluded from affirmativ grammes on the grounc Americans are already do:
Susumi
On an uptick
 Model minority  or ethnic grab-bag?
Diverse as they are, statistically, it is debatable whether it makes any sense to speak of Asian Americans as any sort of cohesive group at all. But, if taken in the aggregate, they comprise by far the fastest growing US minority.
Experts project their numbers to grow by the end of the century to around 10 million, or 4% of the US population. By 2010, they will number nearly 13.4 million, or 5% of the population; and 18 million (or 6.4%) by 2050.
The Chinese were the first to arrive in the 19th century to work in the mines, lay down the rail tracks and perform assorted domestic services. The Japanese, Filipinos, and a few Koreans followed, despite laws and practices excluding Asians from civil rights and citizenship.
Fuelled by a 1965 liberalisation of US immigration laws and the refugee backwash of Indochinese wars, Asian immigration has surged again in recent years. The Asian share of US legal immigration soared from 5% in 1931-60 to nearly 50% in the 1980s, exceeding legal immigrants from Latin America.
The 1965 law abolished the national origin quotas (heavily stacked against
Asians) in favour of preferences for workers with needed skills and relatives of US residents. Some 120,000 immigrants a year were to be admitted from the Western Hemisphere and 170,000 from the Eastern Hemisphere, with a 20,000 ceiling on nationals of any one country (exclusive of immediate family members of already naturalised immigrants as well as refugees).
Most Asian Americans are clustered in just a few states. Three out of five of them live in California, Hawaii or New York. They comprise nearly half of Hawaii s population and are the second largest minority group in California (after Hispanics). Lately there also has been an influx of Asians into cities like Chicago, Washington DC, Philadelphia, Seattle and Houston.
The academic achievements of Asian American students have stirred both admiration and envy. One estimate has it that nearly half of all US graduate students are Asian Americans. Aside from family pressure and bookish cultural traditions, Asian Americans  scholastic distinction might represent a bid to overcome discrimination through good grades, some experts suggest.
Not all Asian America successful, though. Man refugees, for instance, fac midable English-language out of school to find only
Unemployment, howevi low among all Asian Am US-born Asian Americans the same occupations a counterparts. But foreij American immigrants s patterns.
On the one hand, im India, the Philippines an higher ratio of top-payinj agers, professionals and   the other hand, a greater immigrants from China, South Korea found their paying service jobs.
The average family in Asian American groups high, and usually highei Whites. One explanation more family members, i hours, contribute to the notable exception has t namese, whose average ft only 60% that of white t
Susun
Textbook tussle
Demographic shift forces historical reassessment
California is the belwether state where the future of other American states can be observed today. With the influx of Asian Americans and Hispanics, white students have already
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become a minority in California public schools.
Within the next 15 years, whites are likely to become a minority population in the state. Experts project that whites will
eventually become a n wide perhaps by the it As the US continues
European immigrants un commands a majority,
bound to grow stronger and more assertive. But, in its efforts to accommodate the demands of diverse groups, the US risks undermining its commitment to common ideals.
What this could mean for the American self-image is suggested by a recent controversy in California over a new set of history textbooks. A quarter century ago, Sacramento enacted laws requiring all teaching materials to reflect the state s ethnic div