Overview

How do societies respond to great demographic change? This question lingers over the contemporary politics of the United States and other countries where persistent immigration has altered populations and may soon produce a majority minority milestone, where the original ethnic or religious majority loses its numerical advantage to one or more foreign-origin minority groups. Until now, most of our knowledge about largescale responses to demographic change has been based on studies of individual people's reactions, which tend to be instinctively defensive and intolerant. To anticipate and inform future responses to demographic change, Justin Gest looks to the past. In Majority Minority, Gest wields historical analysis and interview-based fieldwork inside six of the world's few societies that have already experienced a majority minority transition to understand what factors produce different social outcomes. Gest concludes that states hold great power to shape public responses and perceptions of demographic change through political institutions and the rhetoric of leaders. Through subsequent survey research, Gest also identifies novel ways that leaders can leverage nationalist sentiment to reduce the appeal of nativism--by framing immigration and demographic change in terms of the national interest.

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Justin Gest is associate professor of policy and government at George Mason University's Schar School of Policy and Government. He is the author of five books on the politics of immigration and demographic change, including The New Minority: White Working Class Politics in an Age of Immigration and Inequality and Crossroads: Comparative Immigration Regimes in a World of Demographic Change. His work has been featured by ABC, BBC, CBC, CNN, The Guardian, Los Angeles Times, NPR, The New York Times, Politico, Reuters, TIME, Vox, and The Washington Post. Clark Cornell was born to a loving family in Greenwich, UK, but had little time to grow up in Greenwich before his family moved to the United States in their pursuit of happiness. Clark earned a BA in English literature from Washington State University, then began an acting career-cast in major roles in theater productions. His other experience includes voicing children's toys, narrating eLearning modules, and voicing audiobooks.

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