March 19, 2024 • 33 mins
Gene and Scott talk with Bill Flores, a political science professor who has put together a pioneering Texas government textbook that focuses on student involvement. As we dissect the evolving political landscape of Texas, Bill's insights into the burgeoning Latino vote shine a light on the potential for seismic shifts in state politics as a newly empowered generation gets ready to leave their indelible mark on history.
The Texas Experiment: Politics, Power, and Social Transformation (Sage, 2023) https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/the-texas-experiment/book276276
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
This podcast is not sponsored by.
It does not reflect the viewsof the institutions that employ
us.
It is solely our thoughts andideas, based upon our
professional training and studyof the past.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
Welcome to Talking Texas History, the podcast that
explores Texas history beforeand beyond the Alamo.
Not only will we talk Texashistory, we'll visit with folks
who teach it, write it, supportit, and with some who've made it
and, of course, all of us wholive it and love it.
Welcome to another edition ofTalking Texas History.
(00:36):
I'm Gene Crois.
Speaker 1 (00:38):
I'm Scott Sosman, gene, one of the best things
that we get on this podcast.
We get to talk to distinguishedscholars and people who work in
all kinds of areas, and we haveanother one here, an author and
a scholar, so why don't youintroduce our guest to everybody
?
Speaker 2 (00:53):
Well, I've got to say this is a good friend of mine
and we've been friends for along time former boss and now
colleague and his name is BillFlores.
Bill, welcome to Talking TexasHistory.
Speaker 3 (01:06):
My pleasure.
Glad to be here.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
So today we want to talk a little bit about a
project that you're working on.
But before we get into that,bill, would you tell people a
little bit about yourself?
A lot of our listeners are ourcolleague historians.
You're not a historian, butyou've been very active for a
(01:29):
long time in Chicano politicsand political studies.
So tell the people a little bitabout yourself.
Speaker 3 (01:35):
Yes, I was born in California, in San Diego, and I
guess the first time that I gotinvolved in anything politically
I was probably about 15, 16years old, maybe a little
younger.
You know, my dad was a veteranof World War II and he actually,
(01:59):
you know, had a purple heartand a broad star for his service
and a favorite.
He came home and founddiscrimination.
It was difficult to get a loan.
It's difficult to buy a house.
My mother and my father grew upin segregated schools.
If you ever go to San Diegothere's the old town San Diego.
(02:23):
It's like many things theybasically recreated, sort of
what the old town would havelooked like.
Well, they do have a schoolthere and that was a school my
dad attended but they don't haveis the sign saying it was a
segregated Mexican only school,because that's the way it worked
(02:44):
.
My mom there's a documentarythat PBS made on.
It's called the Lemon GroveIncident and she actually went
to the school that later splitand then they had a Mexican only
school that was basically in abarn.
So you know, that's the realitythat many people faced in Texas
(03:05):
, california and elsewhere.
And when I was in my earlyteens we saw that we felt
discrimination several times andthere was a law that was passed
.
But it took a lot of communityeffort basically to stop the
discrimination and I thinkthat's the reason why we're so
(03:31):
much more involved in thisBasically to stop the
discrimination in housing, andthis was before federal
legislation, and so Californiapassed that law.
There was a referendum to passit and my parents got involved.
My aunt, who was very involvedin politics in Los Angeles.
(03:55):
She urged us to participate andso I started going around
neighborhoods and stores to getsignature site.
That was my first reallythought about politics.
I didn't know anything aboutthe political system, I just was
doing it because my parentswere, and we had grown up as a
(04:18):
family that was not really notin poverty but lower middle
class and did what we could forothers.
We went to church every week.
Every Sunday we gather food, weput together packages to give
to people that were lessfortunate than ourselves, and so
(04:39):
I learned a lot about that.
There were always people thatwere poorer than us and I
wondered why, and so when I wentto college, that was always
behind my head.
I wasn't a major in politics, Iwas a major, actually, in
(05:03):
healthcare.
I was going to be a doctor,partly because I wanted to serve
underserved communities.
Anyway, I ended up gettinginvolved in local politics in
Los Angeles.
My first book when I was partof a still an undergraduate I
(05:23):
was part of a research team andwe wrote a book about the
politics of the non incorporatedLos Angeles and the and all the
different communities.
Speaker 2 (05:37):
Somewhere.
That was when you were anundergraduate.
Speaker 3 (05:39):
Yes, I came out when I was in the my master, as I was
working on my master's degreeat Stanford.
Speaker 1 (05:48):
Well, dr Forrest, you know you've done a lot of
things in your academic careerand you talked about getting
started as an undergraduate, butyou didn't tell us you rose to
a pinnacle as an academic career.
So why don't you tell us alittle bit about your career as
an academic and what you've doneand what positions you've held?
Speaker 3 (06:04):
Yeah, I, you know I ended up getting going into a
doctoral program at Stanford.
I didn't go to.
I mean, I went into thedoctoral program and with the
intention of getting a PhD inpolitical science.
There was some struggles in thepolitical science department
Because of conflicts that takeplace in an academic disciplines
(06:28):
.
I ended up leaving.
I and several other studentsended up leaving the program for
a while and I worked innonprofits.
I did a lot of consulting workfor a while and I ran a couple
nonprofits and then, afterrunning a health center, I
decided to go back and get myPhD.
(06:50):
And you know the clock wasticking.
You have 10 years to get a PhD.
I asked for the extension Justbefore that clock ended.
Anyway, I got my PhD in atStanford in a combination of
political science and publicpolicy, and so my PhD is in
(07:11):
social theory and public policy,I read.
I worked at a center, aresearch center, the Center for
Chicano Research at Stanford,and I ran some research programs
.
Then I went to Fresno State.
Actually, as before that, I wasteaching at a Catholic
University.
(07:31):
Over time I began not onlydoing research that was,
community action oriented but inaddition being an administrator
, I became an assistant dean atFresno State.
I'd run a research center thereas well and then I became dean
(07:54):
at Cal State, Northridge Provostat New Mexico State.
I was Secretary, DeputySecretary for Higher Education
for the State of New Mexico andthen and then President at the
University of Houston downtown,and since then I've been at
Antioch University and back atUHD teaching political science
(08:15):
nonprofit management and Russia.
Speaker 1 (08:18):
Houston drew you back in and I was spend time at
Fresno.
That means you and I and Geneactually had something in common
there, because I have a friendof mine that he's from
California, he's from the BayArea, so he's biased and he told
me.
He said you know what Fresno is?
The love of California.
Speaker 2 (08:35):
Is that a compliment?
Speaker 3 (08:38):
I don't know, california has a huge
agricultural area in the CentralValley and some of it is very
conservative.
I did a lot of research onwater rights and also on
pesticides and the influence ofthe floating pesticides into the
(09:00):
air and into the land and water, and the communities that were
affected by them tried to dowork that would help those.
Speaker 1 (09:09):
People don't understand California.
Is you know they what theythink of California they
actually only know about?
You know 2% of the state ofCalifornia and I think it's all
like that, don't they?
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:20):
Bill.
So one of the things that Iwant to talk about today and the
reason we asked you to be onthe show you got a new political
science government textbook forcollege classes and it's called
the Texas Experiment Politics,power and Social Transformation.
(09:41):
It's published by CQ Press,which is Sage Publications, one
of their imprints.
So tell us a little bit aboutwhy you thought Texas needed
another government textbook.
Speaker 3 (09:57):
Well, you know, there are plenty of government
textbooks and some of them arevery good.
Each has a lot of strengths andsome weaknesses.
But you know, I hadn't taughtTexas politics.
I was getting my syllabustogether in my course, but I had
been teaching American politicsat UHD for a while, and so I
(10:21):
asked students who were takingthe American Politics course if
they had taken the TexasPolitics course.
I really wanted their reactionand some of them just said, oh,
that course, you know, it'sawful, it's boring.
We've studied government inhigh school.
Why do we have to take thiscourse?
And then I'd ask well, what doyou think about the textbook?
(10:43):
Same thing it's boring.
And so, okay.
Well, what makes it boring?
What doesn't talk aboutanything useful and it makes us
feel less powerful or less ableto do anything.
And so you know, with that inmind, I began building a course
(11:05):
that would really address theissues but get students engaged
early on, including having themfind out who represents them,
going to local meetings, any ofa number of activities that are
right.
From the beginning, they couldbegin to understand that they
(11:29):
have some power, even thoughthey may feel it's just one vote
.
There are many elections in thecountry that one vote is all it
takes, and in fact there havebeen cases in Texas where the
ultimate person who was electedthe city council or mayor.
It was a flip of a coin becausethey'd hold two or three
(11:51):
elections and it'd be tied overand over again if they had small
populations.
So one vote does make adifference, and it was that
experience, and also becauseSage contacted me to do a review
of a book that they were doing,and I started to do that and
they said we love the way youwrite and we've read a net
(12:13):
couple of one of the other booksthat you wrote just recently on
democracy and America inAmerican civic engagement, and
we'd like you to write a book onTexas.
And so that's how the projectbegan.
Speaker 1 (12:27):
Well, that's amazing when you talk about politics in
Texas too, and as a someone whostudies politics and now it's
politics in Texas, let me askyou a question about maybe the
future or what's gonna happen inTexas politics.
What's your take on it?
Particularly the Latino vote inTexas.
That's gonna be the bigdifference in this state going
(12:50):
forward.
They're now a plurality in thestate, and I think both
political parties are going toat least make the attempts to
compete for Latino votes.
So how do you see Texaspolitics?
Let's say, if you had a crystalball, in years from now let's
20, you know, 34, is Texaspolitics going to continue on
the same arc that it is now?
(13:12):
Is there gonna be a sea change?
What's gonna happen?
Speaker 3 (13:14):
Well, that was one of the questions that would come
up in my courses, and so Ithought it was important in the
13th chapter of the book and, bythe way, gene has written the
first chapter on Texas history,and so he's a part of the
project, and I wanna thankEugene for those contributions
but one of the things thatstudents would ask is what is
(13:35):
the future gonna look like?
So actually, I started the bookabout thinking about what is
the future going to look likeand, as a matter of fact, when
we were writing it, it was inthe middle of some of the
elections, and so we begin tosee that, first of all, the no
(14:01):
community is actuallyhomogeneous.
Not all whites vote the sameway, not all blacks vote the
same way and not all Latinosvote the same way, but the
Latino population is verydiverse.
It's like the Asian population.
We tend to say Asians and thenwe lump everybody in it, whether
they came from Pakistan orChina or the Philippines or
(14:23):
whatever else.
Reality of it is is people havedifferent historical
experiences.
Those that were born here andlived here for a long time may
have different views than ifthey came from Fiddlewell or
from Venezuela, and also classbackground makes a difference.
If they came here and faceddiscrimination, and maybe their
(14:47):
parents faced discrimination,they'll have a different
political outlook than those whomay have come from the South
American country and very, verywealthy, so you have to take
that into consideration.
Not everybody's going to votethe same, however.
We have a very unevendistribution of wealth in this
(15:09):
country and it is state.
Texas likes to say it's thecenter of economic development.
Well, that's not always true.
It's.
Certainly we have had a lot ofpeople move here from other
states, but I think the Latinopopulation it's growing, it's
(15:33):
younger, it has real needs foreducation, for healthcare.
This Texas as a state ranks45th in the nation in a lot of
and in some cases 48th in suchareas of healthcare, child
welfare, many other things.
(15:55):
When you look at the proportionof children without insurance,
texas is one of the worst, andthe Latino population is even
worse than that in terms of thepercentage of Latinos that don't
have health insurance.
When you look at publiceducation the kids that are
(16:19):
going to schools that aredilapidated, deteriorated, that
don't have equipment in theirlaboratories, things like that
they tend to be Latino and black, and so we're going into a
situation that's not a goodthing for the state, where the
future of the population that isgoing to be the majority of the
(16:43):
state and is already theplurality of it are not getting
the education or the healthcareor the housing or the other
things that they should and, asa consequence, people vote very
much based on their interests.
You're going to see the statebecome more purple and probably,
(17:04):
down the road, more blueDemocracy.
The change in democracy is notdestiny, but it certainly pushes
a lot and influences how peoplewill, and I think that our
current leaders in the state arevery worried.
They're worried about losingpower and you see them grabbing
(17:29):
it and holding onto it asfiercely as they can.
Redistricting, reapportioning,passing laws to restrict voting.
Long term, that's better people, that's a great answer.
Speaker 2 (17:45):
Yeah, that is a great answer and I mean I think
you're right.
All of that are Topics and youcover in the book and you know,
you and I and Scott, we've allwritten books, we're all
professors.
A lot of times people say youknow, you professor should not
be Assigning books that youwrote because of ethical reasons
(18:06):
or something.
What do you say when peoplecriticize academics for
assigning their own book?
Speaker 3 (18:14):
I just felt that a lot of the books Really we're
not dealing with issues thatstudents wanted to hear and
we're asking me about.
And so you know, I think whenany of us Teach a course, we
bring in and build the coursebased not only on the
requirements that the departmentsets but also on on based on
(18:38):
our strengths and based on the,the issues that are important to
us.
And so when you do that, youbecome an expert in that area
and you know you figure, well,I'll arrange the book
differently.
That that I've been using orI'll focus on and I'll bring in
(19:00):
supplemental.
And after a while you bring inso many supplemental things, you
figure I might as well write abook.
I've doing that right now tobook, because I've been teaching
strategic planning for a whileand I use different books and
then neither one of which I'mreally that happy about.
So I'm writing a book fornonprofits as well as for
(19:20):
students on that.
It will be called non-profitmanagement hitting your target,
moving your nonprofit from whereyou are to where you want to be
.
And again, that's not becauseI'm interested in making money.
Speaker 1 (19:39):
You know Lots of lots of hours.
Speaker 3 (19:44):
So A project for, for you know, selling mysteries,
you know it's a project for loveof Of your subject, but also
because you want to try andshare a perspective that they
will help and that students willrespond to.
Speaker 1 (20:02):
Yeah, we have a lot of listeners that are
educational professionals andProfessors, and then Jean and I
someone I've been a co-authorpart of an American history
textbook.
I also assigned that textbook,by the way and also Jean and I
are currently putting together aTexas history textbook or at
least we're supposed to be.
We're not working in it isShould be.
(20:25):
But as someone who's done this,why don't you share with us
what do you think's the biggestchallenge for putting a textbook
together and what shouldauthors or other textbooks think
about before they take on thatjob?
Speaker 3 (20:37):
Well, you have to understand that it's a
negotiation process.
First, you know, you may havean image of what you're going to
do and in a book and thepublisher has another image and
it's a negotiation with them andalso they edit too and and
they're they're thinking aboutthe market because they want to
(21:00):
sell as many textbooks aspossible, but also they bring up
always Good points about.
You know I'll have you thoughtabout this, or you know here's
something you might consider.
In you, ultimately, you're theauthor and you make decisions
based on what you think.
All right, but they alsounderstand that's that sometimes
(21:23):
you know you need things youhaven't thought about, like
discussion questions, learningoutcomes.
You know Out of points thatthey can be used for the book
when faculty lecture, all ofthose kinds of things.
So it there's a lot involved inwriting a book and you go
(21:45):
through many, many drafts andredrafts Before you have a final
chapter of it you know, thengets published and you work on
selecting.
You know, just like building thegraphs yourself or charts
yourself, I'm working withsomeone to do that, picking the
the photographs from from Acompany that they have a
(22:07):
contract with, etc.
So don't just write it andthink, oh, I'm gonna get rich
because that's not the purpose.
The other is no, it's, it'sgoing to take time, you know.
And the other thing is, whenyou deal with a publisher, it's
(22:27):
hurry up in a way.
You send one thing and a monthgoes by and you haven't heard
anything, sometimes two months,and then suddenly okay, well,
here's, here's our edits, andcan you get this done by Tuesday
?
You know it's monday, well,tuesday of next week will be
okay, but you know, and usuallythat's right in the middle of
midterms, of finals and thepapers, or two or something.
(22:50):
So these are the kinds of thingsthat you have to understand.
It's a balance between what youwant to do and what the
publisher needs, and also you'retrying to balance it with with
the other demands of teaching,the other courses you have in
grading papers and the mainthing that we do as not.
Speaker 2 (23:12):
So, bill, since you know you were talking at the
beginning about your career inCalifornia and whatnot in new
mexico, so when you came totexas and you're teaching these
texas political science courses,is there something about texas
politics that you have foundInteresting?
(23:32):
And the other question is whatdo students find most
interesting?
That that surprises them?
Speaker 3 (23:40):
Well, I think Texas is interesting in many different
ways, not just because it is amore conservative state.
I think that's true across theelectorate.
Certainly it's moreconservative than California,
but California has veryconservative elements as well.
Same thing in New York.
(24:01):
I didn't mention that.
I was a senior fellow at theRockefeller Foundation for a
while.
But one of the things thathappens is that, because of the
nature of both California andTexas, one party is in charge of
(24:25):
triumvirate.
They have the governor, theyhave the head of the Senate and
they control the House.
And when you have that, you'reable to pass any legislation.
Well, the problem is that ifyou don't have a check on it,
then what happens is theextremes start coming in the
(24:48):
plot and you see that sometimesin California on the left, you
see that sometimes in Texas onthe right.
Certainly a lot in Texas rightnow, and that's a very
conservative element,particularly those pushing for
more support for private schoolsand parochial schools, say,
(25:10):
with vouchers.
So, based on the culture andbased on the political climate,
you get very different states,very different bills that they
pass.
In California, new York, theytend to pass things that like
taxation and also more education.
(25:32):
They also very interested inclimate change.
Here in Texas, the view ofthose in power is there is no
climate change or if there is,we can't do anything about it
anyway.
So let's you know.
And, more importantly, jobsmatter more than people sell.
So you know, let's make sure wehave jobs, even if it means
(25:56):
somebody down right next to thatplant is suffering and high
cancer.
And I'm not being facetioushere.
You know we get extremes and Ithink that that's one of the
hardest things for students,because they feel that their
(26:16):
voice is not being heard, thatthey can't do anything to change
the system.
Texas doesn't have a referendum.
You know, you cannot getsomething on the ballot by, as
you can in California or in NewYork with a petition, and, as a
consequence, you have to go toyour legislator, and your
(26:37):
legislator may be in the, in theparty that doesn't have power.
People just feel and right nowcities are for the most part
controlled by Democrats to say,legislative, the governor, the
current general, are we allRepublicans and so they are
passing legislation that isreally restricting the ability
(27:01):
of those like the mayors and theand the judges to enact the
measures that that are healthyfor for their community, and
that's a difficult situation.
You know, if you look to thefuture, 80%, well, 74% of the
entire state's population willbe in the triangle, the urban
(27:26):
triangle, and you know that'sHouston, dallas, san Antonio.
You know all that area 80%.
It's amazing.
Yeah, we're all the power.
Speaker 1 (27:40):
It's amazing and you say extremes and I think that
you know that's such a pressionstatement because just here in
town, in Nacogdoches, is a smallcity, it's a rural area
Republicans dominate things.
Right now we are having avicious, vicious election fight
in the Republican primary forour house seat because and it's
(28:01):
all in it basically it's thisrun to see who can be most to
the right in this in our, in ourcurrent house speaker, I know
and I like he's being challengedby a challenger and his
challenger accuses him of beinga Marxist, leftist and it's all
this.
I mean it's vitriolic and it'sairing people apart.
It's utterly.
(28:21):
Texas politics has always beena full context, sport in the
arena, but it seems to becontinuing and maybe getting
worse, maybe because the stakesare higher.
I don't know that.
That that could be.
When you look in the futureabout that.
You know students.
You say students and youngpeople when they come and that's
one of the things in yourclasses and we're all teaching
(28:43):
young people.
When you have young people inyour classes that you're
teaching, and when you teachthem about politics, we talk
about politics and you alludedto some of this.
Tell us, tell our audienceabout, what students find the
biggest surprises about yourtextbook and in your classes.
What surprises them?
Maybe they do something theydon't know.
Speaker 3 (29:02):
Well, I think what surprises them is that they're
so loot, their legislation isconstantly being passed, or
decisions that are made withoutpublic input, or that when
public input takes place, it'signored.
Text dot is infamous for that.
You know they're going to builda freeway and doesn't matter
(29:25):
what communities they make it on.
That tends to be poor andminority communities, but so is
you know.
You have situated the CCQ.
You know the environmentalquality commission or the
railroad commission, the samething public utilities
(29:45):
commission.
They enact legislation that isfavorable to companies and
sometimes they pass rulesbasically making it impossible
for people to even have a publichearing, and unfortunately,
that really surprises students,but it also makes them angry and
(30:08):
they want to do something aboutit, especially if they live in
those neighborhoods wherethey've seen for years, just,
you know, terrible things goingon in terms of, you know,
environmental impact.
Sometimes their family membersor neighbors have cancer,
leukemia, or you know a childwas born, you know, with some
(30:30):
kind of defect because of theenvironmental impact that has
been created and rules and lawsignored.
I think that's the biggestsurprise.
Speaker 1 (30:41):
That's right and it's you know, we all do this.
We all see students, and we'veall done this for a long time.
I'm seeing students I think youhit on something really good.
They're seeing and they'reangry.
I'm seeing students now moreattuned to being activists yes,
and I did in 15 years ago andthey're wanting to go out and do
things like that.
So so, yeah, I think we mayhave some surprises coming up,
(31:03):
absolutely.
Speaker 3 (31:04):
That's, by the way, why we have in every chapter
what you can do at the end ofthe chapter, because you don't
want students just to befrustrated or feel disempowered,
but to have a pathway so theyknow what they can do to make a
difference.
Speaker 2 (31:21):
Bill, I've got something on this show.
We like to ask our guests whatdo you know?
And so Bill Flores, what do youknow?
Speaker 3 (31:32):
I'll tell you that one thing that I know is that
all changes started with just asmall group of people and who
have said, oh no, we're going todo something about it.
And I encourage students to notjust get angry or not just put
(31:56):
a post on your social media site, but to actually get involved,
because they're the future ofthis state.
And I tell you, when you thinkabout it, in 2050, maybe you're
22 right now Well, just thinkyou're going to be in your late
40s or 50s.
In the next few decades, you'regoing to have own a house,
(32:19):
you're going to have children,maybe even grandchildren.
Is that?
What future do you want foryour children and your
grandchildren?
Because you're the ones thatare going to make that future.
So don't sit on the sidelinesand vote, but don't just vote.
Make change.
Speaker 1 (32:37):
I hope they take that message to heart.
This has been great, bill.
We could sit here and talkabout all these things forever
because it's a greatconversation.
Well, thank you for being here.
I get to Houston quite often.
Next time I get down there,what we'll do?
We'll all get together, we'llgo out to eat and we'll make
Jean pay.
How about that?
That'd be wonderful Lookforward to it.
(32:57):
It's been telling everybodythat I'm spending Jean's money
here the last week or two, likeyou would have later.
Speaker 2 (33:03):
So all the residuals from that book, right?
Speaker 1 (33:06):
That's right.
Maybe we can buy a drink withit.
That's right.
That's right.
But thank you very much.
Speaker 3 (33:14):
It's been very informative and I'm going to be
one of our better episodes.
Speaker 1 (33:17):
I can tell you right now.
Well, thank you so much.
It has been a pleasure, bill,thank you very much.
Thank you very much.
All right, bye.
Thank you for being here, lisa.
This podcast is not sponsored by.
It does not reflect the viewsof the institutions that employ
us.
It is solely our thoughts andideas, based upon our
professional training and studyof the past.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
Welcome to Talking Texas History, the podcast that
explores Texas history beforeand beyond the Alamo.
Not only will we talk Texashistory, we'll visit with folks
who teach it, write it, supportit, and with some who've made it
and, of course, all of us wholive it and love it.
Welcome to another edition ofTalking Texas History.
(00:36):
I'm Gene Crois.
Speaker 1 (00:38):
I'm Scott Sosman, gene, one of the best things
that we get on this podcast.
We get to talk to distinguishedscholars and people who work in
all kinds of areas, and we haveanother one here, an author and
a scholar, so why don't youintroduce our guest to everybody
?
Speaker 2 (00:53):
Well, I've got to say this is a good friend of mine
and we've been friends for along time former boss and now
colleague and his name is BillFlores.
Bill, welcome to Talking TexasHistory.
Speaker 3 (01:06):
My pleasure.
Glad to be here.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
So today we want to talk a little bit about a
project that you're working on.
But before we get into that,bill, would you tell people a
little bit about yourself?
A lot of our listeners are ourcolleague historians.
You're not a historian, butyou've been very active for a
(01:29):
long time in Chicano politicsand political studies.
So tell the people a little bitabout yourself.
Speaker 3 (01:35):
Yes, I was born in California, in San Diego, and I
guess the first time that I gotinvolved in anything politically
I was probably about 15, 16years old, maybe a little
younger.
You know, my dad was a veteranof World War II and he actually,
(01:59):
you know, had a purple heartand a broad star for his service
and a favorite.
He came home and founddiscrimination.
It was difficult to get a loan.
It's difficult to buy a house.
My mother and my father grew upin segregated schools.
If you ever go to San Diegothere's the old town San Diego.
(02:23):
It's like many things theybasically recreated, sort of
what the old town would havelooked like.
Well, they do have a schoolthere and that was a school my
dad attended but they don't haveis the sign saying it was a
segregated Mexican only school,because that's the way it worked
(02:44):
.
My mom there's a documentarythat PBS made on.
It's called the Lemon GroveIncident and she actually went
to the school that later splitand then they had a Mexican only
school that was basically in abarn.
So you know, that's the realitythat many people faced in Texas
(03:05):
, california and elsewhere.
And when I was in my earlyteens we saw that we felt
discrimination several times andthere was a law that was passed
.
But it took a lot of communityeffort basically to stop the
discrimination and I thinkthat's the reason why we're so
(03:31):
much more involved in thisBasically to stop the
discrimination in housing, andthis was before federal
legislation, and so Californiapassed that law.
There was a referendum to passit and my parents got involved.
My aunt, who was very involvedin politics in Los Angeles.
(03:55):
She urged us to participate andso I started going around
neighborhoods and stores to getsignature site.
That was my first reallythought about politics.
I didn't know anything aboutthe political system, I just was
doing it because my parentswere, and we had grown up as a
(04:18):
family that was not really notin poverty but lower middle
class and did what we could forothers.
We went to church every week.
Every Sunday we gather food, weput together packages to give
to people that were lessfortunate than ourselves, and so
(04:39):
I learned a lot about that.
There were always people thatwere poorer than us and I
wondered why, and so when I wentto college, that was always
behind my head.
I wasn't a major in politics, Iwas a major, actually, in
(05:03):
healthcare.
I was going to be a doctor,partly because I wanted to serve
underserved communities.
Anyway, I ended up gettinginvolved in local politics in
Los Angeles.
My first book when I was partof a still an undergraduate I
(05:23):
was part of a research team andwe wrote a book about the
politics of the non incorporatedLos Angeles and the and all the
different communities.
Speaker 2 (05:37):
Somewhere.
That was when you were anundergraduate.
Speaker 3 (05:39):
Yes, I came out when I was in the my master, as I was
working on my master's degreeat Stanford.
Speaker 1 (05:48):
Well, dr Forrest, you know you've done a lot of
things in your academic careerand you talked about getting
started as an undergraduate, butyou didn't tell us you rose to
a pinnacle as an academic career.
So why don't you tell us alittle bit about your career as
an academic and what you've doneand what positions you've held?
Speaker 3 (06:04):
Yeah, I, you know I ended up getting going into a
doctoral program at Stanford.
I didn't go to.
I mean, I went into thedoctoral program and with the
intention of getting a PhD inpolitical science.
There was some struggles in thepolitical science department
Because of conflicts that takeplace in an academic disciplines
(06:28):
.
I ended up leaving.
I and several other studentsended up leaving the program for
a while and I worked innonprofits.
I did a lot of consulting workfor a while and I ran a couple
nonprofits and then, afterrunning a health center, I
decided to go back and get myPhD.
(06:50):
And you know the clock wasticking.
You have 10 years to get a PhD.
I asked for the extension Justbefore that clock ended.
Anyway, I got my PhD in atStanford in a combination of
political science and publicpolicy, and so my PhD is in
(07:11):
social theory and public policy,I read.
I worked at a center, aresearch center, the Center for
Chicano Research at Stanford,and I ran some research programs
.
Then I went to Fresno State.
Actually, as before that, I wasteaching at a Catholic
University.
(07:31):
Over time I began not onlydoing research that was,
community action oriented but inaddition being an administrator
, I became an assistant dean atFresno State.
I'd run a research center thereas well and then I became dean
(07:54):
at Cal State, Northridge Provostat New Mexico State.
I was Secretary, DeputySecretary for Higher Education
for the State of New Mexico andthen and then President at the
University of Houston downtown,and since then I've been at
Antioch University and back atUHD teaching political science
(08:15):
nonprofit management and Russia.
Speaker 1 (08:18):
Houston drew you back in and I was spend time at
Fresno.
That means you and I and Geneactually had something in common
there, because I have a friendof mine that he's from
California, he's from the BayArea, so he's biased and he told
me.
He said you know what Fresno is?
The love of California.
Speaker 2 (08:35):
Is that a compliment?
Speaker 3 (08:38):
I don't know, california has a huge
agricultural area in the CentralValley and some of it is very
conservative.
I did a lot of research onwater rights and also on
pesticides and the influence ofthe floating pesticides into the
(09:00):
air and into the land and water, and the communities that were
affected by them tried to dowork that would help those.
Speaker 1 (09:09):
People don't understand California.
Is you know they what theythink of California they
actually only know about?
You know 2% of the state ofCalifornia and I think it's all
like that, don't they?
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:20):
Bill.
So one of the things that Iwant to talk about today and the
reason we asked you to be onthe show you got a new political
science government textbook forcollege classes and it's called
the Texas Experiment Politics,power and Social Transformation.
(09:41):
It's published by CQ Press,which is Sage Publications, one
of their imprints.
So tell us a little bit aboutwhy you thought Texas needed
another government textbook.
Speaker 3 (09:57):
Well, you know, there are plenty of government
textbooks and some of them arevery good.
Each has a lot of strengths andsome weaknesses.
But you know, I hadn't taughtTexas politics.
I was getting my syllabustogether in my course, but I had
been teaching American politicsat UHD for a while, and so I
(10:21):
asked students who were takingthe American Politics course if
they had taken the TexasPolitics course.
I really wanted their reactionand some of them just said, oh,
that course, you know, it'sawful, it's boring.
We've studied government inhigh school.
Why do we have to take thiscourse?
And then I'd ask well, what doyou think about the textbook?
(10:43):
Same thing it's boring.
And so, okay.
Well, what makes it boring?
What doesn't talk aboutanything useful and it makes us
feel less powerful or less ableto do anything.
And so you know, with that inmind, I began building a course
(11:05):
that would really address theissues but get students engaged
early on, including having themfind out who represents them,
going to local meetings, any ofa number of activities that are
right.
From the beginning, they couldbegin to understand that they
(11:29):
have some power, even thoughthey may feel it's just one vote
.
There are many elections in thecountry that one vote is all it
takes, and in fact there havebeen cases in Texas where the
ultimate person who was electedthe city council or mayor.
It was a flip of a coin becausethey'd hold two or three
(11:51):
elections and it'd be tied overand over again if they had small
populations.
So one vote does make adifference, and it was that
experience, and also becauseSage contacted me to do a review
of a book that they were doing,and I started to do that and
they said we love the way youwrite and we've read a net
(12:13):
couple of one of the other booksthat you wrote just recently on
democracy and America inAmerican civic engagement, and
we'd like you to write a book onTexas.
And so that's how the projectbegan.
Speaker 1 (12:27):
Well, that's amazing when you talk about politics in
Texas too, and as a someone whostudies politics and now it's
politics in Texas, let me askyou a question about maybe the
future or what's gonna happen inTexas politics.
What's your take on it?
Particularly the Latino vote inTexas.
That's gonna be the bigdifference in this state going
(12:50):
forward.
They're now a plurality in thestate, and I think both
political parties are going toat least make the attempts to
compete for Latino votes.
So how do you see Texaspolitics?
Let's say, if you had a crystalball, in years from now let's
20, you know, 34, is Texaspolitics going to continue on
the same arc that it is now?
(13:12):
Is there gonna be a sea change?
What's gonna happen?
Speaker 3 (13:14):
Well, that was one of the questions that would come
up in my courses, and so Ithought it was important in the
13th chapter of the book and, bythe way, gene has written the
first chapter on Texas history,and so he's a part of the
project, and I wanna thankEugene for those contributions
but one of the things thatstudents would ask is what is
(13:35):
the future gonna look like?
So actually, I started the bookabout thinking about what is
the future going to look likeand, as a matter of fact, when
we were writing it, it was inthe middle of some of the
elections, and so we begin tosee that, first of all, the no
(14:01):
community is actuallyhomogeneous.
Not all whites vote the sameway, not all blacks vote the
same way and not all Latinosvote the same way, but the
Latino population is verydiverse.
It's like the Asian population.
We tend to say Asians and thenwe lump everybody in it, whether
they came from Pakistan orChina or the Philippines or
(14:23):
whatever else.
Reality of it is is people havedifferent historical
experiences.
Those that were born here andlived here for a long time may
have different views than ifthey came from Fiddlewell or
from Venezuela, and also classbackground makes a difference.
If they came here and faceddiscrimination, and maybe their
(14:47):
parents faced discrimination,they'll have a different
political outlook than those whomay have come from the South
American country and very, verywealthy, so you have to take
that into consideration.
Not everybody's going to votethe same, however.
We have a very unevendistribution of wealth in this
(15:09):
country and it is state.
Texas likes to say it's thecenter of economic development.
Well, that's not always true.
It's.
Certainly we have had a lot ofpeople move here from other
states, but I think the Latinopopulation it's growing, it's
(15:33):
younger, it has real needs foreducation, for healthcare.
This Texas as a state ranks45th in the nation in a lot of
and in some cases 48th in suchareas of healthcare, child
welfare, many other things.
(15:55):
When you look at the proportionof children without insurance,
texas is one of the worst, andthe Latino population is even
worse than that in terms of thepercentage of Latinos that don't
have health insurance.
When you look at publiceducation the kids that are
(16:19):
going to schools that aredilapidated, deteriorated, that
don't have equipment in theirlaboratories, things like that
they tend to be Latino and black, and so we're going into a
situation that's not a goodthing for the state, where the
future of the population that isgoing to be the majority of the
(16:43):
state and is already theplurality of it are not getting
the education or the healthcareor the housing or the other
things that they should and, asa consequence, people vote very
much based on their interests.
You're going to see the statebecome more purple and probably,
(17:04):
down the road, more blueDemocracy.
The change in democracy is notdestiny, but it certainly pushes
a lot and influences how peoplewill, and I think that our
current leaders in the state arevery worried.
They're worried about losingpower and you see them grabbing
(17:29):
it and holding onto it asfiercely as they can.
Redistricting, reapportioning,passing laws to restrict voting.
Long term, that's better people, that's a great answer.
Speaker 2 (17:45):
Yeah, that is a great answer and I mean I think
you're right.
All of that are Topics and youcover in the book and you know,
you and I and Scott, we've allwritten books, we're all
professors.
A lot of times people say youknow, you professor should not
be Assigning books that youwrote because of ethical reasons
(18:06):
or something.
What do you say when peoplecriticize academics for
assigning their own book?
Speaker 3 (18:14):
I just felt that a lot of the books Really we're
not dealing with issues thatstudents wanted to hear and
we're asking me about.
And so you know, I think whenany of us Teach a course, we
bring in and build the coursebased not only on the
requirements that the departmentsets but also on on based on
(18:38):
our strengths and based on the,the issues that are important to
us.
And so when you do that, youbecome an expert in that area
and you know you figure, well,I'll arrange the book
differently.
That that I've been using orI'll focus on and I'll bring in
(19:00):
supplemental.
And after a while you bring inso many supplemental things, you
figure I might as well write abook.
I've doing that right now tobook, because I've been teaching
strategic planning for a whileand I use different books and
then neither one of which I'mreally that happy about.
So I'm writing a book fornonprofits as well as for
(19:20):
students on that.
It will be called non-profitmanagement hitting your target,
moving your nonprofit from whereyou are to where you want to be
.
And again, that's not becauseI'm interested in making money.
Speaker 1 (19:39):
You know Lots of lots of hours.
Speaker 3 (19:44):
So A project for, for you know, selling mysteries,
you know it's a project for loveof Of your subject, but also
because you want to try andshare a perspective that they
will help and that students willrespond to.
Speaker 1 (20:02):
Yeah, we have a lot of listeners that are
educational professionals andProfessors, and then Jean and I
someone I've been a co-authorpart of an American history
textbook.
I also assigned that textbook,by the way and also Jean and I
are currently putting together aTexas history textbook or at
least we're supposed to be.
We're not working in it isShould be.
(20:25):
But as someone who's done this,why don't you share with us
what do you think's the biggestchallenge for putting a textbook
together and what shouldauthors or other textbooks think
about before they take on thatjob?
Speaker 3 (20:37):
Well, you have to understand that it's a
negotiation process.
First, you know, you may havean image of what you're going to
do and in a book and thepublisher has another image and
it's a negotiation with them andalso they edit too and and
they're they're thinking aboutthe market because they want to
(21:00):
sell as many textbooks aspossible, but also they bring up
always Good points about.
You know I'll have you thoughtabout this, or you know here's
something you might consider.
In you, ultimately, you're theauthor and you make decisions
based on what you think.
All right, but they alsounderstand that's that sometimes
(21:23):
you know you need things youhaven't thought about, like
discussion questions, learningoutcomes.
You know Out of points thatthey can be used for the book
when faculty lecture, all ofthose kinds of things.
So it there's a lot involved inwriting a book and you go
(21:45):
through many, many drafts andredrafts Before you have a final
chapter of it you know, thengets published and you work on
selecting.
You know, just like building thegraphs yourself or charts
yourself, I'm working withsomeone to do that, picking the
the photographs from from Acompany that they have a
(22:07):
contract with, etc.
So don't just write it andthink, oh, I'm gonna get rich
because that's not the purpose.
The other is no, it's, it'sgoing to take time, you know.
And the other thing is, whenyou deal with a publisher, it's
(22:27):
hurry up in a way.
You send one thing and a monthgoes by and you haven't heard
anything, sometimes two months,and then suddenly okay, well,
here's, here's our edits, andcan you get this done by Tuesday
?
You know it's monday, well,tuesday of next week will be
okay, but you know, and usuallythat's right in the middle of
midterms, of finals and thepapers, or two or something.
(22:50):
So these are the kinds of thingsthat you have to understand.
It's a balance between what youwant to do and what the
publisher needs, and also you'retrying to balance it with with
the other demands of teaching,the other courses you have in
grading papers and the mainthing that we do as not.
Speaker 2 (23:12):
So, bill, since you know you were talking at the
beginning about your career inCalifornia and whatnot in new
mexico, so when you came totexas and you're teaching these
texas political science courses,is there something about texas
politics that you have foundInteresting?
(23:32):
And the other question is whatdo students find most
interesting?
That that surprises them?
Speaker 3 (23:40):
Well, I think Texas is interesting in many different
ways, not just because it is amore conservative state.
I think that's true across theelectorate.
Certainly it's moreconservative than California,
but California has veryconservative elements as well.
Same thing in New York.
(24:01):
I didn't mention that.
I was a senior fellow at theRockefeller Foundation for a
while.
But one of the things thathappens is that, because of the
nature of both California andTexas, one party is in charge of
(24:25):
triumvirate.
They have the governor, theyhave the head of the Senate and
they control the House.
And when you have that, you'reable to pass any legislation.
Well, the problem is that ifyou don't have a check on it,
then what happens is theextremes start coming in the
(24:48):
plot and you see that sometimesin California on the left, you
see that sometimes in Texas onthe right.
Certainly a lot in Texas rightnow, and that's a very
conservative element,particularly those pushing for
more support for private schoolsand parochial schools, say,
(25:10):
with vouchers.
So, based on the culture andbased on the political climate,
you get very different states,very different bills that they
pass.
In California, new York, theytend to pass things that like
taxation and also more education.
(25:32):
They also very interested inclimate change.
Here in Texas, the view ofthose in power is there is no
climate change or if there is,we can't do anything about it
anyway.
So let's you know.
And, more importantly, jobsmatter more than people sell.
So you know, let's make sure wehave jobs, even if it means
(25:56):
somebody down right next to thatplant is suffering and high
cancer.
And I'm not being facetioushere.
You know we get extremes and Ithink that that's one of the
hardest things for students,because they feel that their
(26:16):
voice is not being heard, thatthey can't do anything to change
the system.
Texas doesn't have a referendum.
You know, you cannot getsomething on the ballot by, as
you can in California or in NewYork with a petition, and, as a
consequence, you have to go toyour legislator, and your
(26:37):
legislator may be in the, in theparty that doesn't have power.
People just feel and right nowcities are for the most part
controlled by Democrats to say,legislative, the governor, the
current general, are we allRepublicans and so they are
passing legislation that isreally restricting the ability
(27:01):
of those like the mayors and theand the judges to enact the
measures that that are healthyfor for their community, and
that's a difficult situation.
You know, if you look to thefuture, 80%, well, 74% of the
entire state's population willbe in the triangle, the urban
(27:26):
triangle, and you know that'sHouston, dallas, san Antonio.
You know all that area 80%.
It's amazing.
Yeah, we're all the power.
Speaker 1 (27:40):
It's amazing and you say extremes and I think that
you know that's such a pressionstatement because just here in
town, in Nacogdoches, is a smallcity, it's a rural area
Republicans dominate things.
Right now we are having avicious, vicious election fight
in the Republican primary forour house seat because and it's
(28:01):
all in it basically it's thisrun to see who can be most to
the right in this in our, in ourcurrent house speaker, I know
and I like he's being challengedby a challenger and his
challenger accuses him of beinga Marxist, leftist and it's all
this.
I mean it's vitriolic and it'sairing people apart.
It's utterly.
(28:21):
Texas politics has always beena full context, sport in the
arena, but it seems to becontinuing and maybe getting
worse, maybe because the stakesare higher.
I don't know that.
That that could be.
When you look in the futureabout that.
You know students.
You say students and youngpeople when they come and that's
one of the things in yourclasses and we're all teaching
(28:43):
young people.
When you have young people inyour classes that you're
teaching, and when you teachthem about politics, we talk
about politics and you alludedto some of this.
Tell us, tell our audienceabout, what students find the
biggest surprises about yourtextbook and in your classes.
What surprises them?
Maybe they do something theydon't know.
Speaker 3 (29:02):
Well, I think what surprises them is that they're
so loot, their legislation isconstantly being passed, or
decisions that are made withoutpublic input, or that when
public input takes place, it'signored.
Text dot is infamous for that.
You know they're going to builda freeway and doesn't matter
(29:25):
what communities they make it on.
That tends to be poor andminority communities, but so is
you know.
You have situated the CCQ.
You know the environmentalquality commission or the
railroad commission, the samething public utilities
(29:45):
commission.
They enact legislation that isfavorable to companies and
sometimes they pass rulesbasically making it impossible
for people to even have a publichearing, and unfortunately,
that really surprises students,but it also makes them angry and
(30:08):
they want to do something aboutit, especially if they live in
those neighborhoods wherethey've seen for years, just,
you know, terrible things goingon in terms of, you know,
environmental impact.
Sometimes their family membersor neighbors have cancer,
leukemia, or you know a childwas born, you know, with some
(30:30):
kind of defect because of theenvironmental impact that has
been created and rules and lawsignored.
I think that's the biggestsurprise.
Speaker 1 (30:41):
That's right and it's you know, we all do this.
We all see students, and we'veall done this for a long time.
I'm seeing students I think youhit on something really good.
They're seeing and they'reangry.
I'm seeing students now moreattuned to being activists yes,
and I did in 15 years ago andthey're wanting to go out and do
things like that.
So so, yeah, I think we mayhave some surprises coming up,
(31:03):
absolutely.
Speaker 3 (31:04):
That's, by the way, why we have in every chapter
what you can do at the end ofthe chapter, because you don't
want students just to befrustrated or feel disempowered,
but to have a pathway so theyknow what they can do to make a
difference.
Speaker 2 (31:21):
Bill, I've got something on this show.
We like to ask our guests whatdo you know?
And so Bill Flores, what do youknow?
Speaker 3 (31:32):
I'll tell you that one thing that I know is that
all changes started with just asmall group of people and who
have said, oh no, we're going todo something about it.
And I encourage students to notjust get angry or not just put
(31:56):
a post on your social media site, but to actually get involved,
because they're the future ofthis state.
And I tell you, when you thinkabout it, in 2050, maybe you're
22 right now Well, just thinkyou're going to be in your late
40s or 50s.
In the next few decades, you'regoing to have own a house,
(32:19):
you're going to have children,maybe even grandchildren.
Is that?
What future do you want foryour children and your
grandchildren?
Because you're the ones thatare going to make that future.
So don't sit on the sidelinesand vote, but don't just vote.
Make change.
Speaker 1 (32:37):
I hope they take that message to heart.
This has been great, bill.
We could sit here and talkabout all these things forever
because it's a greatconversation.
Well, thank you for being here.
I get to Houston quite often.
Next time I get down there,what we'll do?
We'll all get together, we'llgo out to eat and we'll make
Jean pay.
How about that?
That'd be wonderful Lookforward to it.
(32:57):
It's been telling everybodythat I'm spending Jean's money
here the last week or two, likeyou would have later.
Speaker 2 (33:03):
So all the residuals from that book, right?
Speaker 1 (33:06):
That's right.
Maybe we can buy a drink withit.
That's right.
That's right.
But thank you very much.
Speaker 3 (33:14):
It's been very informative and I'm going to be
one of our better episodes.
Speaker 1 (33:17):
I can tell you right now.
Well, thank you so much.
It has been a pleasure, bill,thank you very much.
Thank you very much.
All right, bye.
Thank you for being here, lisa.
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