The Presumed Alliance: The Unspoken Conflict Between Latinos and Blacks and What It Means for America

Arguing that the Black community is ""at best indifferent, and at worst opposed, to the interests of the Hispanic community"" and that the""zero-sum conflict"" over limited resources""trumps any idealized notion of Latino-Black cooperation,"" Vaca's polemical first book is sure to raise eyebrows in the civil rights community, which he says usually tries to gloss over such conflicts in public. Vaca presents and analyzes several convincing examples to support his controversial point, gathering together journalistic accounts that show that there was more Black on Latino violence than Black on white violence during the Rodney King riots and that many African Americans hold deep prejudices against Mexicans and other Latin Americans. According to the author, who works as a lawyer in California and who often teaches at U.C. Berkeley, one of the main areas of conflict between the two groups is hiring. While most Latino labor groups would like to see the employer sanctions in the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 repealed, Black labor groups support the sanctions, which they believe puts some check on the fact that""whites prefer to employ Latinos because they feel uncomfortable around Blacks."" With recent census numbers suggesting that Latinos will surpass Blacks as the nation's largest minority group by 2005, it is unlikely that the tensions Vaca reports will diminish anytime soon.""The real challenge,"" he writes,""is how Latinos will handle the leadership role that the numbers will bestow on them."" Though a few of its sections get bogged down by the relentless number of facts and figures, this forceful and provocative book is an excellent choice for readers who want better understanding of minority relations today, and tomorrow.