The two books that have occasioned this symposium represent efforts to research thoroughly, think rigorously, and argue honestly about complex and significant issues of race and ethnicity in America. There is much to be learned from them on many topics. I read them chiefly for insights about whether and how a defensibly democratic politics of egalitarian change can be achieved by, for, and with racial minorities in a country whose majorities, like most majorities, have long been reluctant to pursue policies that did not predominantly benefit themselves. I raise some challenges to the perspectives offered in these books, but only as an effort, kindred in aim if not achievement, to carry forward the work they have thus far so nobly advanced.
