The Center for Politics and Race in America at Rutgers University-Newark was named in honor of the late-Lt. Gov. Sheila Y. Oliver, the first Black woman in New Jersey to hold statewide office, at a ceremony attended by Lt. Gov. Tahesha Way,
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James Jones was appointed as the inaugural director for the Center for Politics and Race in America at Rutgers Newark.
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Dr. Jones testifies on how to improve access to congressional internships
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Dr. Jones was interviewed by Karen Grigsby Bates, Senior reporter for NPR Codeswitch, about the Capitol attack and racism within the congressional workplace.
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The same lawmakers moving to address racism in policing nationwide have shown little interest in fixing their own house.
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“We must finally hold Congress accountable for whom they hire. If Congress is to have an important role in helping us achieve an anti-racist future, they can only do so, if they first clean up their own house.”
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Dr. Jones contributes an image of a Black worker to the Social Science Research Council’s Covid-19 Time Capsule for Future Researchers.
He spoke with Clare McGranahan, discussing the key role of Black congressional workers in maintaining Capitol Hill’s functioning during the pandemic, and why these workers should be central to our understanding of the relationship between race, power, and inequality in Congress.
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Congressional internships matter. These work opportunities are an expression of democratic citizenship that support the day-to-day operations of the federal legislature, train and socialize political novices to lawmaking, and provide a pipeline to paid employment and elective office. Unequal access to these work opportunities means that whites are almost exclusively credentialed to work in Congress.
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Dr. James Jones is interviewed on the Sociocast podcast about his research by Drs. Neda Magbouleh, Clayton Childress , and Aliza Luft
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We, the many, don’t need a politician to be ‘the one’
What if America took a lesson from the women of “Sex and the City” and abandoned the idea of finding “the one”? What if instead of searching for the one who will complete us, we found fulfillment in each other? What if instead of scouring for a leader who will define a generation, we looked at the next president as a mere accessory to the political organizing that we dedicate ourselves to and what will ultimately transform our governing institutions and culture?
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This week, the B-Side sits down with Waverly Duck (University of Pittsburgh) and James Jones (Rutgers Newark). Duck is the author of No Way Out: Precarious Living in the Shadow of Poverty and Drug Dealing (University of Chicago Press). Jones working on his book, The Last Plantation.
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Dr. Jones spoke at “Framing the Value of Diversity & Inclusion in Higher Education: Setting the Research Agenda" a national academic conference hosted by Rutgers University on October 6th 2017. His presentation was titled "Race to Power: Challenging institutional inequality in the U.S. Congress.”
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Students of color have earned the right to be on any campus they set foot on, and their colleges and universities are better off for having them. Yet, the ways that we continue to discuss race remain limited to the experience of people of color and not how institutional systems are predominantly structured to benefit those from already privileged backgrounds.
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Traditionally, you are supposed to learn from your older siblings. They are more mature, have experienced the world, and have acquired knowledge that can make your life much easier. However, sometimes, learning goes in the other direction.
In the past few years, I have come to learn a lot about being an out and proud gay black man from my younger brother.
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The Black professional staff I interviewed often brushed the nod off as a common cultural practice shared among African Americans outside of Capitol Hill. However, my analysis shows that what happens in these ephemeral interactions goes beyond signaling a quick greeting. Instead, it conveys important information about what it means to be Black while working in a White-dominated political institution.
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I advocate as a primary recommendation that members of Congress collect and publish demographic data on its employees. Congress should follow the same set of rules that it imposes on others. The lack of data on this issue prevents this problem from moving beyond the Beltway boundaries.
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There will be many headlines this week about the most diverse Congress ever. Those headlines will be accurate, but misleading. While it is true that the incoming Congress will represent the largest number of women and racial minorities ever to serve in the House and Senate, overall Congress will still be 80 percent white and 80 percent male.
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“Moonlight” is more than just an LGBT story. It subtly redefines who and what the black community is. Yes, there is violence, drugs, and poverty there. However, by focusing on the ordinary lives within in a black neighborhood, we see fuller representations of black life.
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In 1978, Glenn famously labeled Congress the “Last Plantation,” to highlight how the institution was exempt from federal workplace laws, making the legislature one of the last places where racial discrimination was allowable. The senator spent much of his twenty-year career on Capitol Hill working to end this congressional double standard that exempted lawmakers from the laws they passed.
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