I found what you wrote interesting. I agree that there is no robust South Asian identity but surely there is a Hindu identity? I’ll add that I can’t stand New York and believe a plausible explanation for the OP’s question is that Hindus can do better than running for office in that shithole!

• Varun

I was thinking Ms. Saujani might be particularly worth interviewing now after having completed her first electoral campaign so she could reflect on what might have helped her do better. You’re saying there’s a lack of access. What does she feel that she didn’t have access to because of her being South Asian (rather than because of her being a relative NYC newcomer, without any prior electoral experience, whose whole career had been on Wall Street)?

My advice to Americans with ancestral roots in the Indian subcontinent (this is the traditionally used term that’s preferable to “South Asia” for referring to the geographic region in question): do not fall for this “South Asian American” identity trap.

Instead, freely and fully assimilate in the American society, contribute to it by excelling in your education, careers and businesses, and participate in the American political process (such as running for office) first and foremost as your own person and a proud American (but one who is also proud of and relates to his or her ancestral heritage from the Indian subcontinent at a personal level.)

Besides, why would and why should Indian-Americans rush to share an identity with anti-America and anti-India Jihadists like Faisal Shahzad, Tahawwur Rana and “David Coleman Headly” (Daood Sayed Gilani), who are products/byproducts of the Pakistani regime’s terrorism and never-ending obsession against India?

That’s an ingenious idea. Oh wait, I already did.

http://www.sepiamutiny.com/sepia/archives/006306.html

She was on the board of the non-profit I started in 2003.

The point is, it’s not about local candidates – it’s about the systems involved that keep South Asians from having access. And New York, w/ it’s F-ed up state government that cat fights in their chambers and city politics that are literally run by a history of hundreds of years of political machine and old boy’s network – that despite the large South Asian population, they have to work doubly hard to combat machine power. And sometimes they become the sellouts to the machine itself.

I think the most notable political run by a South Asian in NY was probably the challenge by Reshma Saujani in a Democratic Congressional primary last year. She’s worth reading up on and maybe trying to interview if you’re interested in South Asian politics in NYC. From what I understand, she seems to have figured out that it’s hard to jump from a Wall Street career directly to being a Congresswoman, and since her primary loss has switched to a public service job. I suspect you’ll see more of her now that she’s working her way up the government ladder. I don’t think this is a bad thing.

Female politicians even in the vaunted western U.S. also put in years at obscure positions before hitting a national radar. Sarah Palin was on the city council of a tiny town for 5 years, then was its mayor for two terms. She failed in a bid for lieutenant-governor, but loyally campaigned for the guy who beat her because he was on the Republican ticket. She didn’t come out of nowhere; she established herself among Alaskan Republicans (before switching to “I’m busting up the good ol’ boys club” mode once she got appointed to a regulatory commission that allowed her to find out dirt on fellow Republicans — hard to get to such a position unless you’re initially trusted by the good ol’ boys).

Frankly, unless you have celebrity or money, it’s very difficult anywhere in America to be elected to an important position without having spent some time in the political trenches. This tends to annoy people who want smaller government because they’d like to elect folks like Meg Whitman (who didn’t even vote for most of her life) as “fresh voices” who will chop government down to what they deem an “efficient” size — generally by privatizing as much as possible.

it’s not just new york. much of the northeast has a more powerful institutional set of systems which channel political leaders up a set of defined ladders. in contrast, the american west is at the opposite extreme, with more focus on direct democracy, decentralization, and independent voting. this is the standard explanation for why the northeast has traditionally elected far fewer women than the west; women are less likely to be ‘career politicians’ who use the system to work their way up the ladder.

btw, count me against tribal politics. i am against the majority-minority districts too…even though they help republicans by district packing democrat voters (i’m republican for readers who don’t know).