Our book Multiethnic Moments: The Politics of Urban Education Reform (Clarke, Hero, Sidney, Fraga & Erlichson 2006) examined dimensions of civic capacity and their implications for urban education reform, with specific reference to four cities — Denver, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Boston — and focused on the period of the early into the late 1990s. We began with the puzzle that significant reform efforts seemed to be accompanied by persistent discontent and low outcomes for students of color, particularly Latino students, who made up a substantial portion of the student body in three of the four cities.

We argued that a fuller understanding of the issues required an analytic framework that directly examined three core dimensions of politics: the configurations of interests, ideas, and institutions. We concluded that for significant change to occur, transformations in all three dimensions would be needed. Specifically, substantial changes would be needed in:

• interests: minority groups’ resources, cohesion, articulation, and coalition formation;
  
  
• ideas: the creation of new policy images, problem definitions, and policy solutions responsive to multiethnic concerns but also resonating with broad values and wider audiences;
  
  
• institutions: the creation of institutional arrangements that consolidate and reinforce these interests and ideas.

Has this occurred? In this article, we consider changes in education policy and politics since our study ended. We suggest that a new reform paradigm has emerged, characterized by emphases on performance, proficiency, and punishment. We set out our framework and summarize earlier findings, then analyze the current moment and consider the implications for Latino students and families, the largest (now-not-so-)new constituency in many, if not most, U.S. cities.

Briefly Looking Back

Multiethnic political divisions, especially regarding education, were central features for a growing number of cities in the 1990s. This multiethnic condition was often analyzed through the White/ Black paradigm of the previous era. That paradigm is hardly irrelevant even now; it does not, however, adequately consider the importance of “new” and rapidly growing minority groups and the resulting uncertainties about problem definitions and policy solutions. In important respects, the politics of education during this era appeared most influenced by groups seeking goals that were not necessarily hostile to minority groups, but that did not directly address minority groups’ central concerns.