Administration & Society

Volume 40 Number 8
January 2009 825-851
© 2009 Sage Publications
Latina Administrators 10.1177/0095399708326346
http://aas.sagepub.com
in Local Government hosted at
http://online.sagepub.com

The Interplay of Role Orientation

and Policy Intentions
Christine Thurlow Brenner
Rutgers University, Camden, NJ

Latina administrators in urban municipal bureaucracies experiencing demo-

graphic change are continuously constructing their role—at times calling on
their ethnic/nationality lens and at other times drawing on their racialized,
feminist perspective and always mindful of their institutional context.
Personal interviews with 16 Latina administrators provide rich insights into
the ways race/ethnicity, gender, and institutional context intertwine in affect-
ing policy outcomes. Three Latina administrator role orientations—activists,
bridge builders, and institutionalists—are identified and linked to strength of
identity to theoretical bases of representative bureaucracy, Latina critical race
theory, new institutionalism, and concepts of legal and cultural abidance.

Keywords: Latina administrators; critical race theory; new institutional-

ism; legal abidance; cultural abidance

T his article examines the factors shaping the role orientations of

Latinas as they assume significant administrative leadership roles in
communities with changing demographics and how those roles are used in
pursuing their policy intentions. The convergence of bureaucratic actions
and the changing racial demographics of a community largely focuses on
policy outcomes (e.g., Borjas & Hilton, 1996; Hero & Tolbert, 2004; Soss,
Schram, Vartanian, & O’Brien 2003); however, the roles an individual
assumes in the policy process and how the institution influences the indi-
vidual may also play critical roles in policy outcomes.

What Narratives Can Reveal About Policy Intentions

Qualitative data obtained through the interview process is by its nature
subjective, representing the viewpoint of the interviewee. The interpretative
voice of an individual involved in local government policy determination

825
826 Administration & Society

gives important insight into the process. This postpositivist approach solicits
Latina public administrators’ viewpoints to determine the meanings and pur-
poses they ascribe to their actions.
Local government city managers and/or business administrators may be hir-
ing Latinas to increase the gender, racial, and ethnic representativeness of their
administration. Mayors may have the political goal of increasing outreach to the
Latino/a immigrant community. Other managers may focus on the bureaucratic,
institutional requirements of the position not discussing gender or ethnicity to
avoid potential equal employment opportunity complaints. Whether appointed
or hired through the civil service system, Latina administrators are left to con-
struct their own relationships with the Latino/a immigrant community within the
parameters of their official position. The different policy intentions of the Latina
administrators are also affected by how they view their role once joining the
local government administration. Using narrative analysis it is possible to dis-
cover whether goals of representativeness were part of their institutional con-
struction of their administrative positions within municipal government.
Narratives also give insight into the reasons for Latina administrators’
actions. Through the stories they relate, the Latinas reveal some of the fac-
tors that prompt their actions. Maynard-Moody and Musheno’s (2003) cul-
tural abidance theory posits the citizen-agent narratives of street-level
workers, indicating that they make judgments about the identity and moral
character of the individuals they serve, which in turn affects the level and
quality of service they deliver to the individuals. Examining the Latina
administrators’ narratives may uncover whether cultural abidance, in par-
ticular ethnic or gender identification with citizen-clients, influences their
policy intentions, which may shape an agenda of active representation of
Latino/as. Alternatively, if the state-agent perspective (Maynard-Moody &
Musheno, 2003) is dominant, then bureaucrats place greater emphasis on
law abidance and the appropriate application of laws, rules, and procedures.
This view suggests that we may find some narratives that reveal that
Latinas’ primary focus is on the institutional demands of their positions
rather than on leveraging their standing within the local government admin-
istration to address the needs of the Latino/a immigrant community.
This article begins by sketching out three theoretical frameworks, represen-
tative bureaucracy, feminist theory, and new institutionalism, that may assist in
the understanding of the Latinas’ policy intentions as expressed in their narra-
tives. Personal interviews with Latina local government administrators then
provide rich insights into the ways race and ethnicity, gender, and institutional
context intertwine to affect their policy goals. Specific examples of policy out-
comes shaped by Latinas’ participation in the policy process are also discussed.
 Brenner / Latina Administrators in Local Government 827

The key research question is, “How are the role orientations and policy
intentions of Latinas in local governments shaped by role identity, new institu-
tionalism, and representativeness?” By examining the narratives of Latina
public administrators, this article unpacks the various factors that influence the
policy aims they pursue in their official positions. Although the use of narra-
tives does not permit empirical testing of the concepts investigated in the
research, they are “powerful and evocative research tools” (Maynard-Moody &
Musheno, 2003, p. 28), which provide insight into the reasoning behind atti-
tudes and decisions. These insights will assist public managers in understand-
ing the breadth of Latina responses to their public roles and may help them craft
more effective working relationships, which is important in light of the grow-
ing Latino population in the United States. Additionally, Latinas who aspire to
public service will gain ideas about the way working in local government
administration can both challenge and free them to pursue their policy goals in
a manner consistent with the role orientation they choose to assume.

Latinas and Representative Bureaucracy

The rich literature on representative bureaucracy advances the theory
that when governmental agencies employ a diverse workforce the institu-
tions become more politically responsive to the larger community (Hindera,
1993; Keiser, Wilkins, Meier, & Holland, 2002; Riccucci & Meyers, 2004).
Thielmann and Stewart (1996) also found that there is a demand for repre-
sentative bureaucracies at the level of client service. Furthermore, Meier
and Smith (1994) revealed the reciprocal relationship between political
election of minority officials and high-level minority bureaucratic repre-
sentation, thereby linking political success with access to bureaucratic
resources for minority groups. The extent to which the workforce reflects
the demographic characteristics of the general population or the clients the
organization serves is seen as passive representation. Conversely, those
governmental employees who advocate for the interests of their clients
and/or gender, socioeconomic status, or racial/ethnic group exhibit active
representation (Mosher, 1968, 2003; Selden, 1997). Riccucci and Saidel
(1997) also found that there is a difference between appointed and career
public servants in their approach to representativeness.

Latinas and Feminist Theory

Dominant Western feminist theory was built on the assumption of the essen-
tialism of female experiences. Gender identity, which is socially constructed
828 Administration & Society

from a universal perspective, supports Beauvoir’s now famous pronouncement

that “one is not born a woman, but rather, becomes one” (as cited in Dietz,
2003, p. 401). This definition of feminism failed to take into account the dif-
ferences in female experiences based on social class, race and ethnicity, and
sexual orientation and tended to privilege the experiences of middle and upper-
middle class Anglo women (Marquez, 2001).
Diversity feminism attempted to overcome this “class-biased ethnocen-
trism” (Alarcón, 1990, p. 364) by embracing the breadth of gender under-
standing that incorporates the perspectives of women of color, marginalized
and exploited women, women living in poverty, and women of various sexual
orientations (Dietz, 2003). Critical race feminism’s antiessentialism also
rejects the notion of a single female voice. Zevalla (1989, p. 28) found that
“Chicana theorists were concerned with the simultaneity of experience: how
race, class and gender are experienced by Chicanas concurrently,” a concept
echoed by Garcia (1989). Crenshaw, Gotanda, Peller, and Thomas (1995)
expanded on this view in their intersectionality theory, which layers gender
into critical race theory (Delgado & Stefancic, 2001). Similarly, Wong (2003,
p. 7) uses “the term multiplicative identity to describe the concept that women
of color are not merely white women plus color or men of color plus gender.”
Verba and Scholzman (1993) noted that Latino/as were substantially dis-
advantaged in comparison to African Americans and Anglo-Americans
with regard to political resources at their disposal that might establish a
springboard for successful political participation. Gutierrez’s (1999) inter-
views with Chicana judges in Texas established that age, family size, mar-
ital status, and cultural bias are barriers to Hispanic women seeking public
office. However, Jones-Correa (1998, p. 346) also observed that for
Latino/a immigrants gender influences participation, “While men are more
likely to remain involved in first generation immigrant organizations,
women more often take on the role of intermediaries between the immi-
grant community and the surrounding society.”
Early Latina activists in organizations such as League of United Latin
American Citizens (LULAC) constructed feminine organizational struc-
tures that originally depended on their kinship relationship, as wives and
relatives, to male leaders, which evolved into independent women’s coun-
cils to fully integrated membership in male-dominated leadership councils
(Orosco, 1988). Belen Robles, the first Latina elected president 65 years
after the founding of LULAC, stated that women’s active involvement is an
awakening to “bigger and greater participation in the Hispanic community.
This is the transition to the next century.” (Cole, 1994, p. 12). Similarly,
within El Partido de la Raza Unida, there was an active women’s caucus,
 Brenner / Latina Administrators in Local Government 829

Mujeres Por La Raza, and women served as leaders of the party at the state
and national levels and on the executive board (Acosta, 2006).
Latinas also played critical roles in other civil rights groups. One such
example is Dolores Huerta, who organized, alongside Caesar Chavez, the
founding of the United Farm Workers in 1962 and organized the East coast
component of the California table grape boycott. Her work, which helped
raise the profile of the farm worker’s union, was motivated by the hunger
and poverty she saw as a teacher among the children in her classroom
(Dolores Huerta Foundation, 2003).

Latinas and New Institutionalism

In addition to the influence of feminism in shaping Latinas’ roles in local
governments, the institutions themselves may play a role in shaping how
Latinas see themselves in their position and influence their policy intentions.
As Nielsen (2001, p. 505) notes, “A multitude of institutionalist approaches
are flourishing in the social sciences.” The sociological approach to analyz-
ing institutions advanced by the new institutionalism allows a researcher to
explore the intersection of gender, race, and ethnicity with institutional roles
and context. Through the use of norms, rules, and other structures such as
hierarchies, institutions exert influence over the behavior of individual actors
within a bureaucracy. Likewise, informal institutions, “such as schemata,
roles and scripts” bring pressure on individuals to conform (p. 505).
New institutionalism also suggests that institutional demography and the
“cross-section of the lives of people involved” within the institution affects
the way organizations adapt through turnover (March & Olsen, 1984,
p. 744). Furthermore, if individual behavior within institutions is
constrained or taken for granted as Scott (2001, p. 57) suggests, because
this is “the way we do these things,” then the introduction of Latina admin-
istrators may lay the groundwork to challenge some of these traditional
ways of “doing things.” Building on the observations of Keiser et al. (2002,
p. 557), which suggest that it is “through institutional practices that gender
becomes politically salient,” we might expect the confluence of gender,
race, and ethnicity to follow a similar path. March and Olsen (2005, p. 21)
in their recent reflections on 20 years of new institutionalism find that there
“is a need for improved understanding of the processes that translate polit-
ical action into institutional change.”
The confluence of these three theoretical perspectives, representative
bureaucracy, feminist theory, and new institutionalism, frames this article.
This article examines the way Latinas’ multiplicative identity influences
830 Administration & Society

their policy intentions within a local government bureaucracy. The article

also explores the way Latinas’ roles in municipal governments allow them
to translate concerns of race, ethnicity, and gender into institutional change,
which affects policy outcomes. Peters (2001, p. 223) finds that “profes-
sionals in agencies become the source of new policies within their sphere
of competence, having both expert knowledge and some interest in the
expansion of their agencies.”

Method

Beginning in the spring of 2004 through fall 2005, I conducted inter-

views with local government officials in 39 of the 51 new Latino/a desti-
nations in the United States. The new Latino/a destinations, according to
Pew Hispanic Center and the Brookings Institute, are those metropolitan
areas that had a small Latino/a population in 1980 and experienced rapid
(more than 150%) growth by 2000 (Suro & Singer, 2002). Latino/as in
these communities may still comprise a relatively smaller percentage
of the total metropolitan population, but the burgeoning Latino/a
growth during the past two decades is indicative of major community
demographic shifts.
The 39 cities were selected to provide broad-based geographic coverage
in terms of size and national location reflecting the primary urban areas in
the new Latino/a destinations as defined by Suro and Singer (2002). The 39
cities ranged in size from 52,000 to 711,000. Twenty-two of the cities had
populations of more than 250,000, as shown in Table 1. The greatest
number of cities were located in the south (n = 17), followed by the
Midwest (n = 9). In the west and northeast, five communities were the site
of local government interviews, and three interviews were conducted in the
Pacific Northwest.
Using the narrative story method of investigation, which engages the
research subject as a coresearcher in defining a study’s parameters, I asked
the chief city administrator to identify the municipal employee(s) who
could explain the city’s initiatives with their Latino/a community. This
“privileging” of the chief administrator’s view of who the knowledgeable
and informed administrative personnel are ensured the interviewees’ role or
responsibilities included working with the community’s Latino/a popula-
tion (Ospina & Dodge, 2005). This process resulted in actual interview
subjects of both genders and included Anglo, African American, and
Latino/a administrators.
 Brenner / Latina Administrators in Local Government 831

Table 1
New Latino Destination Interview Cities by Size
and Region of Country
Region of Country

Size of City South Midwest West Northeast Northwest

Less than 250,000 (n = 17) 9 1 1 5 1

More than 250,000 (n = 22) 8 8 4 0 2
Total (N = 39) 17 9 5 5 3

As a part of my overall research on local government responsiveness in

the new Latino/a destinations in the United States, 16 of the nearly 100
interviews I conducted were with Latinas who held professional and/or
managerial positions in their respective municipal government. The inter-
views lasted from 1 to 2½ hours in length and dealt with a range of issues.
Three of the interviews consisted of one-on-one conversations with the
Latina administrators, and in the other 13 interviews, additional profes-
sional and administrative staff members were present apart from the Latina
administrators. These 16 interviews form a nonprobability sample for this
article. Pseudonyms were assigned to each of the 16 Latina administrators
to protect the confidentiality of their interviews.
The semistructured interviews sought responses from the public admin-
istrators regarding policy initiatives affecting Latina immigrants in key areas
of typical local government responsibility, including economic develop-
ment, human resource policy, and public safety practices among other areas
(see Brenner, 2006, in press). This article draws on the open-ended questions
posed during the interview, following the structured portion of the discus-
sion. The primary source of the narratives examined in the article comes
from responses to the following two questions: “Can you tell me how you
became involved in local government service?” and “Can you tell me in
what ways, if any, you have been able to use your position to impact policy
affecting Latino/a immigrants?” Content analysis of each individual’s narra-
tive response to these two questions was conducted. The unit of analysis is
the individual interviewee’s response to each of the research questions. In
addition to providing a sequential ordering of events, the narrative content
provides “the evaluative function, making clear the meaning of those events
and experiences in the lives of participants (Labov and Waletzky 1967,
republished 1997)” (Elliott, 2005, p. 38). Elliott also finds that understand-
ing the individual’s perspective can “help explain why people make a
832 Administration & Society

Table 2
Latina Administrators’ Position and Educational Attainment
Educational Attainment

Level of Position Less Than College College Degree

Cabinet level 0 6
Program manager 0 3
Assistant to cabinet level 0 3
Street level 3 1
Total (N = 16) 3 13

Source: Author’s personal interviews, 2004-2005.

particular decision or follow a particular course of action” (p. 122). From

this perspective, then, the “interview [serves] as an inscription of narrative
production” (Czarniawska, 2004, p. 55). Before turning to the Latina admin-
istrators’ narratives, an overview of the demographic characteristics of the
interviewees provides a background context for their comments.

Demographics of Latina Public Administrators

Six of the Latina interviewees held cabinet-level positions in city gov-

ernment, as shown in Table 2. Three were program managers, an additional
three were assistants to cabinet-level administrators, and the remaining four
were street-level bureaucrats (Lipsky, 1980). Political participation of
immigrants is largely a function of socioeconomic status and development
of English language skills (Tam Cho, 1999). It is not surprising then that all
but three of the Latina administrators held a college degree. Those without
college degrees were all street-level bureaucrats.
Six of the Latina administrators worked in communities where more
than 55% of the local Latino/a population were foreign-born. Eight Latinas
were employed in cities with predominantly native-born Latino/a popula-
tions, which included three Latinas from municipalities where between
20% and 40% of the native-born Latino/as were born on the island of
Puerto Rico (Table 3).
The national heritage of the Latina administrators reflects overall
national immigration trends. Seven Latinas were second or later generation
Mexican Americans. Three women were U.S. citizens born on the island of
Puerto Rico. The two Cuban administrators were naturalized citizens. The
remaining four Latina administrators were immigrants from the Dominican
 Brenner / Latina Administrators in Local Government 833

Table 3
Citizenship of Latina Administrators and Nativity
of Latino Municipal Population

Citizenship of Latina Administration

(U.S. Citizen)
Percentage of Latinos in City
Who Are Foreign-born Native-born Naturalized Foreign-born

Less than 50% 8 0 1

50% or more 1 2 3
Total 9 2 4

Source: Census 2000 Summary file 3 (SF3), PCT 63H, Place of birth by citizenship status
(Hispanic), and author’s personal interviews, 2004-2005.

Republic (2), El Salvador (1), and Guatemala (1), who have legal perma-
nent resident status.
Six of the Latina administrators were under the age of 30. The majority
of the Latinas were middle-aged women aged between 30 and 55. The fol-
lowing discussion reflects the insights garnered from this diverse group of
Latina administrators.

Discussion

Latina Administrators and Institutional Change

The introduction of Latinas at the upper levels of local governmental
bureaucracies changed the institutional demography of their organizations.
Although existing rules and norms shape the Latinas’ role definition,
Latinas found themselves in positions where they can bring attention to any
ambiguity and inconsistency of rule application or normative approaches to
policy affecting the Latino/a community.
Initially, some Latinas were in a position to simply observe the differ-
ential treatment of Latino/as within the institutional structure. Lack of lan-
guage accessible services was one important issue mentioned by a
majority of the Latinas interviewed. Galena,1 a Latina police officer noted:

When Latinos were arrested there was no one to translate. Regardless of my case
load, I would get called to the scene, because I was the only officer who could
speak Spanish. One time I was called out in the middle of winter. I had three
834 Administration & Society

broken ribs. They brought me on a stretcher and propped me up against the wall
outside the crime scene. There had been a gang shooting so half of the suspects
were inside the building and the others were outside in the cold. They had me
translating back and forth between the two groups until three o’clock in the
morning. There was no one else to call. (Galena)

Language access presented an institutional challenge to bilingual Latina

administrators. Those like Galena, who are called on to translate, are per-
forming an invaluable service when there is lack of institutional capacity
(Brenner, 2006). In pain from her broken ribs, Galena demonstrates her
pragmatic approach to her job; “There was no one else to call.” Bilingual
Latina administrators not only aid their monolingual Spanish-speaking
coethnics but they also assist the monolingual English speakers who cannot
perform their municipal jobs without being able to communicate with those
in the Latino/a community who cannot speak English or have limited English
proficiency. However, this role holds the potential of creating Kanter’s (1977,
p. 99) “dilemma of indispensability,” warning that women who find them-
selves in positions where they are indispensable can be “defeating for the
[translator], it was also self-defeating for the organization.” Bilingual Latina
administrators, while performing needed institutional translation services, face
the prospect of professional sticky floors, if the local government does not
address the need to develop an organizational capacity to handle issues of lan-
guage accessible governmental services (Padavic & Reskin, 1994; Reichman
& Sterling, 2004).
For Galena and the Spanish-speaking community there was a positive
outcome to the issue of limited language access to governmental services.
Through a multiyear process Galena worked with leadership in the police
department to institute changes that addressed the issue of language barri-
ers. The police department adopted a new language access policy, which
included hiring a private, certified demand-responsive translation service.
In addition, the city established a specialized unit within the police depart-
ment to work with ethnic minority communities, and Galena was one of the
first officers assigned to the new unit. Thus, her original intentions of sim-
ply using her bilingual skills to assist in a criminal investigation become
transformed through the inclusion of other police officers, immigrant com-
munity leaders, and the police chief, leading to a new culturally and lin-
guistically appropriate community policing policy. This policy outcome
reflects Hall’s (1995, p. 6) theory of transformation of intentions, which
finds that “the policy process occurs temporally through developmental
phases and spatially linked sites of responsibility . . . in each phase actors
 Brenner / Latina Administrators in Local Government 835

build on past consequences and through collective activity to further the

process by constructing policy.”
The human resources (HR) director of another city correctly observed that
many of the lower-level positions in municipal government did not require
English language proficiency. By relaxing the language requirements for main-
tenance and custodial workers, and some public works and cafeteria positions,
she initiated institutional changes in hiring practices. During her tenure she also
used her position to expand the city job line from English-only to bilingual
English–Spanish. In addition, she and her staff provided ad hoc translation for
individuals who came into the HR office to apply for city jobs. Yet, when asked
about her role as a Latino/a advocate, she brushed that suggestion aside.

What I did was never about advocacy. The rules just didn’t make sense. Who says
you have to speak English to clean rest rooms or fill pot holes. We needed the work-
ers and there were no reasons to have language keep us from hiring a good worker.
Besides, as long as there were bilingual supervisors it all worked out. (Soledad)

Soledad’s focus as a career civil servant, rather than as a political

appointee, was on institutional needs—filling jobs—rather than advocacy
for community. Her articulated preference was to fill the many vacant jobs
in city government, which ultimately were her responsibility as HR direc-
tor. Yet, in the process of being an effective administrator, the impact is to
expand opportunities for the Latino/a community. “Statements of intent
leave open what, specifically, government is to do” (Rose, 2001, p. 2). In
Soledad’s case, she creatively expands her applicant pool by removing the
obstacle of language. Her commitment to Maynard-Moody and Musheno’s
(2003) concept of legal abidance, following the hiring rules and regulations,
did not change as a result of this policy expansion.
Other Latina administrators found challenging existing norms more
problematic, especially when their immediate supervisor was not overly
sympathetic to change. Although Inez was specifically hired as a Hispanic
liaison, she found her boss was more interested in following established
methods of operation. Her desire to reach out to the Latino/a community in
an effort to make city services and governance more inclusive was hindered
by an immediate supervisor who did not want institutional change.

I get really frustrated sometimes. I had a lot of ideas. I spent time developing
an outreach strategy. But in the end, I spend a lot less time as a liaison than
doing the routine tasks of the department. Sometimes I wonder why my boss
hired me. It makes me think someone must have pressured him into it. (Inez)
836 Administration & Society

“The ‘hard’ version of the policy intention criteria is that not only must
the bureaucracy be interested in the preservation of existing policies, but it
also must be interested in imposing a new set of policy priorities” (Peters,
2001, p. 222). Inez’s experience with her supervisor demonstrates the way
her policy intentions are thwarted by his resistance to new policy priorities
to expand service in the Latino/a immigrant community. The contradiction
between the way her supervisor structured her position and the stated hir-
ing policy goal of establishing a cooperative relationship with the immi-
grant community “undermine innovation and practice which might value
difference and redress disadvantage” (Milbourne, 2002, p. 329).
Often, the Latina administrators worked in the mayor’s election cam-
paign prior to accepting a position of public service. The close ties estab-
lished during the campaign and the Latinas’ effectiveness in getting out the
Latino/a vote as well as advising the mayor on Latino/a issues was critical
in their selection for inclusion in new municipal administration. Several of
the Latina administrators were directly appointed to cabinet-level positions
by the mayor, indicative of the new administrations’ level of openness to
establishing a bureaucracy reflective of the community (Meier, 1993). In
this way, Latinas move “personal connection between officialdom and the
community and function as the ears of politicians” from the informal cam-
paign setting to the formal institutional setting (Hardy-Fanta, 1993, p. 63).

I worked really hard in the mayor’s campaign. It was important to support

him. He was the first candidate to really listen to the concerns of the Latino
community. I was proud to accept when he asked me to join his administra-
tion. (Graciana)

The mayor knew me from my work in the nonprofit community. I was exec-
utive director of the nonprofit for more than 20 years. He knew I was a trusted
voice in the (Latino/a) community. Now when I talk about the people’s
needs, the mayor listens. (Isabela)

Allen (2001, p. 164) reminds us that “personalities matter in policy-

implementation networks.” First, we see mayors appointing these Latinas to
high-profile cabinet-level positions, signaling to the public and others in the
bureaucracy that serving the Latino/a immigrant community was a priority
in their administrations. Although Allen (2001) suggests that there may be
a variety of ways to achieve the mayor’s policy goals, “the appointment of
‘sympathetic individuals’” in key positions clearly helps to advance their
goals. Second, the Latinas are attracted to the opportunity to serve in these
 Brenner / Latina Administrators in Local Government 837

mayors’ administration because the chance to have the Latino/a immigrant

communities’ voice heard and translated into policy outcomes is very
promising. Isabella and Graciana had direct loyalty to the mayors who
appointed them (Riccucci & Saidel, 1997); however, it would be the over-
lap of their policy intentions with the mayors that would create the window
of opportunity to advance policies that serve the Latino/a immigrant com-
munity interests (Kingdon, 1984).
Having an institutional champion provided greater leverage for Latinas
as they implement shared policy intentions. Fernandez & Rainey (2006,
p. 7) find that one of the ingredients for successful institutional change is
that “an individual or group within the organization should champion the
cause for change.” In both of the following cases the mayor is able to trans-
late Latino/a immigrant economic development goals advocated by Latina
administrators to the larger business community.

Some people complain that I spend a lot of my time working with Latino busi-
ness owners. But the mayor just tells people, “Before she came we were a dying
community. The unemployment roles were high and the businesses were clos-
ing faster than we could count. These new Hispanic businesses are the future of
this community.” I tell people I’ll work with anyone, but only the Hispanics
moving from [a major metropolitan area] have the money to invest in new busi-
nesses. They ran successful businesses in [city], sold out at a profit, and are com-
ing here to build a new business and make a better life for their families. It helps
to have the mayor run interference for me in the community. (Serena)

I work with the international community. My contacts are in Latin America.

Some people think we should spend more time growing local businesses. Some
local business owners complain about spending city resources for travel to Latin
America. The mayor really believes in this initiative. It’s helped to have him tell
the chamber and others that this is a small expense to help expand our city’s
international markets. I think it would be much harder to get the resources I need
to do my job, if I didn’t have the mayor’s support. (Camila)

In Serena’s case, race and ethnicity were not reflected in the design of
the city’s economic development initiatives; however, the actual policy out-
come disproportionably benefited Latino/a immigrant business owners. Her
policy goals to grow the economic vitality of the community transmit into
her willingness to work with all prospects, and her success is enhanced by
her positive cultural identity and language sensitivity to the Latino/a new-
comers. Camila, however, confronts the “wicked context” problem, where
new programs must fit into the “matrix of established programmes” (Rose,
838 Administration & Society

2001, p. 16). Her challenge is to translate the same policy intentions Serena
had, growing the local economy into a more broadly defined global trade
arena. She brings to her position a number of contacts in Latin America and
sees the international connection between her city and those in the southern
hemisphere as a fruitful opportunity to expand local exports. The potential
obstacle of local business persons’ resistance to this expansion is mitigated
by the active role the mayor plays as a policy entrepreneur, in effect “soft-
ening up” the local business community and thereby enlarging the window
of opportunity for her implementation strategy (Kingdon, 1984).

Latina Representation and Benefits to

the Latino/a Community
Whether the Latinas in this study were appointed or entered through the
traditional civil service system, their presence in the municipal bureaucracy
established representation for the larger Latino/a community. We return to
the theory of representative bureaucracy to explore whether the Latinas
administrators were able to translate their policy intentions and influence
policy outcomes to benefit the Latino/a immigrant community (Meier,
O’Toole, & Nicholson-Crotty, 2002). Prior studies by Hindera (1993),
Meier (1993), and Selden, Brudney, and Kellough (1998), among others,
found that minority representation within a bureaucracy leads to policies
that benefit an agency’s minority clientele.
All but three of the Latinas were in their position less than 2 years. Of
the three who were long-term municipal employees, Berta had the greatest
experience level with 10 years of career experience in her present position.
She talks about how over time, as she gained the trust of the residents, she
was influential in establishing programs to benefit the low-income Latino/a
community she served.

When the police department decentralized, I was appointed to a Weed and

Seed community relations position because I was bilingual. It was the first
time police officers were permanently deployed in the Latino community. We
had a small store-front office in the neighborhood. I started by working with
the Catholic priest to organize community information fairs where we could
talk with the community about public safety. I spent a lot of time translating
materials into Spanish. I’m most proud of the fact that I helped start a
Spanish-language citizen’s police academy. So many of the people are immi-
grants. They came from countries where you can’t trust the police. They did-
n’t understand how the American [justice] system works. We’re a real part of
the community now. (Berta)
 Brenner / Latina Administrators in Local Government 839

Berta’s narrative shows how she capitalized on an opportunity, her

appointment as a community relations officer, to develop over time a
number of programs for the Latino/a immigrant community. She began
implementing her policy goals by partnering with the parish priest, whose
acceptance of her helped diffuse the fear many immigrants had of law
enforcement officials. As she begins to win the immigrants’ trust, she is
able to make further progress. Peters (2001, p. 223) notes that “those
bureaucrats interested in changing policies may have to wait a number of
years before implementing their ideas, so that sufficient popular and polit-
ical support can be generated.” Each new program—the community
fairs, the translation of public safety materials, and the citizens’ police
academy—advances her policy goals and builds on the growing acceptance
of the police in the immigrant community and the successful implementa-
tion of the prior initiatives. Her positive attitude toward the Latino/a immi-
grant community supports Maynard-Moody and Musheno’s (2003) concept
of cultural abidance in which street-level bureaucrats such as Berta go out
of their way to offer assistance and make the police practices accessible to
the immigrants, who are seen as worthy recipients of police aid.
Whereas Berta’s successful policy outcomes required years of service in
the Latino/a immigrant community, Graciana and Lara implemented their pol-
icy intentions much more quickly. Graciana and Lara were the first cabinet-
level Latino/a employees in their respective cities. Both had been in their
positions less than 2 years, appointed following recent mayoral elections.
Although they held very different positions in the municipal government, both
were effective in a relatively short period of time in making meaningful con-
tributions that benefited the Latino/a community. Graciana speaks first,

When the mayor appointed me boards and commissions administrator, I knew

I had a big job in front of me. There was very little cultural sensitivity on the
boards. Under previous administrations, it seemed like economic development
concerns was the overarching goal of appointments. The mayor has been very
open to my suggestions for new appointees as positions have become available.
I’ve also spent a lot of time visiting with leaders in the Latino community to
convince them of the importance of public service. I want their voice to be
heard when important decisions are being made. (Graciana)

Graciana recognized that the Latino/a community was marginalized

from participation in the policy process. She encouraged their political
involvement by building on her relationships in the Latino/a immigrant
community. Her positive relationship with the mayor facilitated placement
of Latino/as on city boards and commissions, which might prove to be a
840 Administration & Society

first step toward advanced political incorporation for some of the

appointees (Browning, Marshall, & Taub, 1984). Again we see positive cul-
tural judgments about the value Latino/a immigrant voices add to the pol-
icy making process (Maynard-Moody & Musheno, 2003). This assessment
of Latina administrators functions in a way that creates a new space on
public bodies so that the immigrant voice is not only heard but also moves
immigrants to the policy agenda setting and decision-making table.
Lara talks about seeking a solution to a complex neighborhood problem.
Her role as an active representative for a gang-riddled low-income Latino/a
community was critical in forcing other city departments to step up the
plate to provide services and improve the community. The breadth of her
administrative discretion in seeking solutions is also important to the ulti-
mate outcome of the situation (Sowa & Selden, 2003).

There’s this neighborhood that had a growing gang problem. It was cut off
from the rest of the city by a couple of Interstates [highways]. Workers from
many of the city departments refused to go into the neighborhood because the
gang violence had gotten so bad. A lot of it was turf wars over the drug trade.
I got together representatives from the departments responsible for service in
the area. We talked about the fears their workers had about answering service
calls. I told them we can’t just ignore this neighborhood. We had to work out
a solution. I spent a lot of time on coalition building. Eventually, we brought
some community representatives into the process. Today, the coalition meets
monthly to map out strategies. City workers go in teams when they respond
to neighborhood calls. The police got the drug dealers out of the parks, so it’s
safer for the kids. We’re working on plans to open a community center. (Lara)

Lara was able to get other city departments to rethink the process of pro-
duction of services for this low-income Latino/a immigrant community.
Milbourne (2002, p. 229) finds that “an understanding of social exclusion
and appropriate remedies must surely rely on a better understanding of such
increased social polarization . . . between those who are poor, suffering
deprivation or multiple disadvantages” and the rest of the community, rep-
resented by the fearful distancing of city workers. Her commitment to the
immigrants, “I told them we can’t just ignore this neighborhood,” and her
willingness to persevere in seeking an administrative solution emphasized
her belief in the value of this Latino/a immigrant community and spurred
her coalition-building efforts, which ultimately led to improved public
services for a previously marginalized community.
We move now to the consideration of the way Latinas’ role as women
affects their policy intentions.
 Brenner / Latina Administrators in Local Government 841

Latina Administrators and Critical Race Feminism

Parker and Stovall (2004) find that one of the

most significant tasks of a teacher or scholar who plans to utilize CRT [crit-
ical race theory] (or LatCrit, etc.) is to develop tools that help generate
knowledge designed to describe, analyze and empower people of color and
to help change negative social forces into positive social forces as they
impact on everyday life.

From the perspective of critical race feminism, we would likewise expect

the Latinas in this study to call on their multiple role identities as women,
Latinas, and public servants to empower their clients within the bureau-
cracy and work to change policies that may marginalize the Latino/a com-
munity in particular and women in general. These factors were in play
when I first spoke with Aldona to set up an interview. After I identified
myself as a university professor, at first she refused to see me.

I’m sorry I’m too busy. I’m tired of these studies. We [referring to Latino/as]
have been studied to death. The local university, they only come here when
someone needs data for a dissertation. I’m much too busy working for real
change for my people. We’ve been marginalized too long. Now I’m in a posi-
tion help the mayor bring my brothers and sisters into the mainstream. (Aldona)

Aldona’s strong positive cultural identity and valuing of the Latino/a

immigrant community is clearly articulated in her policy intentions, “to
help bring my brothers and sisters into the mainstream.” She is jaded from
her previous experience with academics and is unwilling to advance their
agenda, as she finds that it distracts her policy intentions. Like a protective
mother, she seeks to shield the Latino/a immigrant community from possi-
ble exploitation. Only after I convinced her that the goal of my research was
to benchmark municipal best practices for working with Latino/a immi-
grants would she agree to the interview. At that point she was willing to
facilitate a meeting between the two of us and two other Latino/a adminis-
trators to discuss local initiatives. She clearly saw a “fault line” (Smith,
1987, p. 139) between her experience with academic researchers and the
perceived manipulation of Latino/as by the academic community.
Most of the Latina administrators interviewed for this study framed their
policy intentions more through the lens of race/ethnicity than from the fem-
inist perspective. However, almost all the administrators used personal skill
sets to advance Latino/a agendas that are socially recognized as feminine.
842 Administration & Society

Through their ability to forge coalitions, to cooperate with persons within

the bureaucracy as well as outside in the larger community, and to facilitate
communication between disparate groups, they demonstrate core feminist
skills. Damita uses all of these skills in her job to diffuse a community
conflict.

My office is responsible for federal compliance, but we’re also charged with
running an efficient office. Lawsuits are really expensive for the city, and it
sometimes takes years for cases to resolve through the courts. We place a lot
of emphasis on negotiation and encourage people to seek solution outside the
formal judicial system. We have a pretty good track record, which means the
city often looks to our office to help mediate disputes. One of the ways we
do that is through public listening forums.

Recently, there was a lot of tension between the police and the Latino com-
munity. We set up a listening forum to talk about the issues. The police were
very uncomfortable with the process—showed up in force, all of them in uni-
form. Almost no one from the community was willing to come, let alone talk.
I worked with the police to convince them to come out of uniform to the next
meeting. After a series of meetings with leaders in the Latino community,
assuring them immigration wouldn’t be there and that the police would not
make arrests, or try to silence community members, they finally agreed to
come to another forum. That night I did the translation, so everyone was able
to speak. One of the most important changes to come out of the meeting was
the establishment of the special program in the police department to increase
patrol and services to the Latino community. (Damita)

Damita’s ability to tone down the hegemonic police response and calm
the fears of the immigrant community to begin conversation between the
two groups is a testament to her mediation skills. In pursuit of her policy
goals of increased communication and problem-solving dialogue, she nego-
tiated a new space for discussion. The immigrants were able to gain
more control over the nature and method of public safety intervention in
their community. Although “there is a fundamental contradiction between
[immigrant] participatory practice and established powerful institutions
[like the police] which places multiple tensions at the heart” (Milbourne,
2002, p. 340) of the policy outcomes, the resultant changes in police prac-
tices benefited the immigrant community. Damita successfully negotiated
between the competing tensions of the police emphasis on legal abidance
and conformity to the letter of the law and her cultural abidance, which val-
ued Latino/a immigrants as contributing members of the local community,
to affect policy change (Maynard-Moody & Musheno, 2003).
 Brenner / Latina Administrators in Local Government 843

Some of the Latinas talked specifically about their work with women,
echoing concerns of Latina liberal feminism (Pesquera & Segura, 1993)
and its interest in improving the marginalized status of women. The gender
connection they made with their clients served to transform a confusing
bureaucratic maze of regulations to an understandable and manageable
level. Beatriz, a bilingual program aide, connects with Latinas on many
levels—as an immigrant, a woman, and a Latina.

It is so hard for the women to come forward [after an incident of domestic

violence]. I start by telling them my story. I fought for change in [Central
American country] where women were regularly being raped, often by police
officers and other officials. I tell them I survived, and they can too. Yes, I
know it’s hard for them to trust the police. Sometimes I go with them to court.
They need to know things are different in America. (Beatriz)

Beatriz’s commitment to empowering victims of domestic violence

grew from her own painful past, “I survived,” and her strong cultural iden-
tity and valuing of the battered immigrant Latinas. She focused institutional
attention on the most intimate concerns of immigrant women and provided
emotional support for the abused women as they negotiated the judicial sys-
tem. Her culturally appropriate approach is consistent with the basic tenets
of therapeutic jurisprudence in cases of domestic violence and helped
decenter the role of the police (Brenner, 2007; Erez & Hartley, 2003;
Wachholz & Miedema, 2000). She served as an important link between the
women and a complex legal/justice bureaucracy and demonstrated that sur-
vival did not equate with defeat.

Policy Intentions and Latina Administrators’

Role Identity

All the Latinas discussed crafted a personal role within their

administrative structure that allowed them to pursue their policy inten-
tions. Three main role types emerged from these interviews—activist,
bridge builder, and institutionalist (as shown in Table 4). This section
of the article demonstrates how their role orientation and policy inten-
tions are influenced by the strength of their identity with various the-
oretical perspectives.
Activist Latinas used their positions within the city bureaucracy to advo-
cate for policies that would benefit the Latino/a community. Their proactive
approach toward implementing their policy goals led them to initiate new
844 Administration & Society

Table 4
Latina Administrators’ Role Orientation and Strength
of Identity With Theoretical Perspectives
Strength of Identity With Theoretical Perspective

Representative Feminist New

Role Orientation Bureaucracy Theory Institutionalism

Activist High Medium Low

Active representation. Gendered issue Willing to
Proactive, initiating new salience. challenge
programs responding existing
to needs in Latino/a institutional
community and seeking structures
fair share of bureaucratic and norms.
resources forLatino/a
community.
Bridge builder Medium High Medium
Active representation. Gendered strategies. Knowledge of
Cultural broker for Coalition building, norms
Latino/a community collective problem regulations used
by translating needs solving, to help Latino/
to others within the networking. as negotiate
bureaucracy. the bureaucracy.
Institutional Low Low High

programs and seek their fair share of bureaucratic resources to respond to

needs in the Latino/a immigrant community. This is reflective of a high level
of identity with the active representation strand of representative bureaucracy
theory and strong positive cultural identity with and valuing of the immigrant
community. Activist Latinas accept, embrace, and act on their role as minor-
ity representative (Selden, 1997). Some of the Latinas focused their activism
on gendered issues. In the case of domestic violence, Beatriz’s position
within the administration allowed her to address issues affecting the lives of
Latinas marginalized by violence, a traditional feminist concern. Activist
Latinas were not constrained by existing bureaucratic norms. Their willing-
ness to challenge “the way things are done” and either ignore, through
bureaucratic discretion, or refute existing practices places them in opposition
to concepts of new institutionalism, which find that institutional norms exert
a conforming influence on employees. Instead, we see the citizen-agent nar-
rative that “draws attention to worker’s constant focus on who citizens are as
much as what they do” (Maynard-Moody & Musheno, 2003, p. 13).
 Brenner / Latina Administrators in Local Government 845

Latinas who function as bridge builders see their role in the bureaucracy
somewhat differently. They draw most heavily on gendered strategies to
influence policy outcomes as they seek to implement their policy goals.
Coalition-building strategies and networking between the local government
administrative structure, nonprofit organizations, and the Latino/a commu-
nity assist bridge-building Latina administrators. Their pragmatic problem-
solving follows the citizen-agent narrative (Maynard-Moody & Musheno,
2003), and like the Latina activists, reflects active bureaucratic representa-
tion. In their position within the local government administration Latinas
serve as cultural brokers linking the needs and concerns of the Latino/a immi-
grant community, and translating and interpreting those needs to a bureau-
cracy more accustomed to working with other racial/ethnic demographic
groups. Finally, for Latina bridge builders, knowledge of the institutional
norms, rules, and regulations is critical. They are able to use that knowledge
to help Latino/as negotiate the bureaucratic structure. Latina bridge builders
reflect the feminist practical wisdom that Stivers (2002) finds is essential,
acknowledging the relationships between those they serve and those they
work with in their communities. They mirror the role Hardy-Fanta (1993,
p. 23) identified in Boston Latinas, “in addition to their roles as connectors
between City Hall and the community, Latina women are connectors among
members of the community to help the community solve its problems.”
The third role Latinas assume in their administrative positions is an insti-
tutional one. Closely aligned with the theoretic concepts of new institution-
alism, institutional Latinas are bureau women, assuming a traditional
administrative role (Selden, 1997). Institutional Latinas focus on their roles
and responsibilities to the local government administration. They are often
career civil servants rather than political appointees, and their policy inten-
tions are cojoined with those of the bureaucracy. They emphasize the impor-
tance of existing rules and regulations in accomplishing their bureaucratic
mission; however, they also demonstrate a willingness to expand norm def-
initions to meet institutional goals. Soledad was able to meet hiring goals
with Spanish-speaking workers, thereby allowing her to accomplish her HR
management mission. The institutional innovation was the use of bilingual
supervisors, who would manage the new workforce and ensure their confor-
mance to institutional norms, rules, and regulations. Institutional Latinas
frame their responsibilities in terms of their position, and there is an absence
of either gendered issue salience or gendered strategies to accomplish their
administrative responsibilities. And whereas institutional Latinas may come
to their jobs as passive representatives of their racial/ethnic community, they
may convert their role to one of active representation, not because that is the
846 Administration & Society

Figure 1
Potential Role Overlap of Latina Administrators’
View of Policy Intentions

Bridge

Activitist Institutionalist
Builder

goal of their actions but as a consequence of simply carrying out their job
responsibilities.
These three role types are not mutually exclusive, as seen in Figure 1.
Successful activists may employ the outreach, coalition development strate-
gies of the bridge builders. Institutionalists may serve as cultural brokers,
like the bridge builders, to reach into the immigrant community to accom-
plish their organizational goals.

Conclusion

Through the narratives of Latina public administrators, this article

unpacks the various factors that influence the policy aims they pursue in
their official positions. Just as race and culture are socially and culturally
constructed, Latina administrators are continuously constructing their role
in urban municipal bureaucracies—at times calling on their ethnic, nation-
ality lens and at other times drawing on their feminist point of view. These
interviews, although limited in number, indicate that Latina administrators’
integrated multiplicative identities allow them to realize many of their pol-
icy intentions within municipal government, thereby influencing policy
decisions affecting their coethnic community. From their unique positions
in the city bureaucracy, Latina administrators are able to shed light on
ambiguous rules and norms that may have previously marginalized Latino/a
clientele and residents. Although the small sample size limits the general-
izations from this type of research, the role typology suggests a framework
that may guide future research.
The majority of Latina administrators constructed an activist role to
advance their policy goals. Many also enhanced their success in implementing
 Brenner / Latina Administrators in Local Government 847

goals through the use of bridge-building feminist strategies. Thus, although

race and ethnicity served as their primary lens, establishing strong positive
cultural valuing of Latino/a immigrant communities, their citizen-agent
narrative (Maynard-Moody & Musheno, 2003) was enhanced by collabora-
tive networking and negotiation both within the local government bureau-
cracy and also reaching out to the nonprofit, faith-based, and immigrant
community.
Those few Latinas whose role in local government was most clearly
identified with legal abidance, applying the rules and norms of the bureau-
cracy, found that even in “just doing one’s job” they pushed the edges of the
norms. Through their institutional practices we find that not only does
gender become politically salient, as Keiser et al. (2002) suggested, but race
and ethnicity does as well.
One of the limits of the study is the formal settings in which the inter-
views occurred. Elliott (2005, p. 128) suggests that formal settings, such as
a workplace, “may provide even more explicit control of the way in which
personal narratives can be told.” It is possible that this setting coupled with
the presence of others during many of the interviews may have influenced
the interviewees’ comments. Because narratives are “produced in this par-
ticular setting, for this particular audience, for these particular purposes”
(Chase, 2005), future researchers may choose to conduct exclusively one-
on-one interviews in settings that are removed from the workplace, as that
might encourage expanded narratives.
Further research is also needed to understand if the study findings are
transferable to communities with established Latino/a immigrant commu-
nities and across a broader representation of administrative positions. In
addition, the rapid expansion of late-20th and early 21st century immigra-
tion to the United States from Africa and Asia suggests other avenues for
expanding this exploratory research, as these women of color are hired or
appointed to local government administrative positions.

Acknowledgments

This article was originally presented at the 2006 annual meeting of the
Western Political Science Association. The author gratefully acknowledges
the research support provided by Rutgers University through the Graduate
School, a Research Council Grant, and a Rand Faculty Fellowship. The
author is also grateful for helpful comments of conference attendees and
Professors Patrice Mareschal, Jenny Kehl, Deborah Wright, Irasema
848 Administration & Society

Coronado, and Kathleen Staudt on earlier drafts of this article as well as

anonymous reviewers. The author would especially like to thank the Latina
administrators for their candor and insight into their roles in local govern-
ment bureaucracies.

Note
1. Names of the Latina administrators were changed for this article.

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Christine Thurlow Brenner is an assistant professor of public policy and administration at

Rutgers University. Her research interests include the impact of public policy and government
capacity on immigrant integration, U.S.–Mexico border, and public budgeting. She is coeditor
of Digame! Policy and Politics on the Texas Border. Her articles have been published in
Journal of Public Management and Social Policy, Public Administration, and Journal of
Business and Entrepreneurship.