Casual conversation helps untangle complex challenges

America's evolving cultural makeup and the role that diversity may play in the 2024 presidential election generated insightful discussion as Penn College held its 2023 Technology & Society Colloquia on Wednesday night.

The presenter for the program – “Changing Demographics and the 2024 Election: The Politics of Race and Ethnicity” – was Luis Ricardo Fraga, the Rev. Donald P. McNeill, C.S.C., Professor of Transformative Latino Leadership; the Joseph and Elizabeth Robbie Professor of Political Science; the director of the Institute for Latino Studies; and Fellow at the Institute for Educational Initiatives at the University of Notre Dame.

His campus appearance is part of Notre Dame’s Hesburgh Lecture Series and was sponsored by the Notre Dame Club of Greater Williamsport.

A Q&A moderated by Craig A. Miller, professor of history/political science and department head for social sciences and humanities, probed a wide expanse in the Davie Jane Gilmour Center's first-floor presentation room, including a shortfall in voter participation among the country's Latinos and Asians at a time when those segments of the population are growing.

It seems counterintuitive that an increased presence doesn't translate into a greater voice, the speaker said.

But as some numbers get larger, he explained, so does opposition to participation by people comprising those groups. Notions that hark back to the post-Civil War Reconstruction period, "ideas of who belongs and who doesn't belong," have sparked a resurgence of resentment that leads aggrieved parties to counter every step toward inclusion.

That has led to a tug of war, he said, between the forces of electoral suppression – those working to limit the number of polling places or purge voters from the registration rolls, for instance – and those mobilizing to register more voters and make sure they go to the polls.

"It's fun for a scholar to try to figure out, perhaps, but not for a country to go through," Fraga said.

The Corpus Christi, Texas, native engagingly addressed a number of other topics: many of them practical, some provocative and some prompted by audience questions. Among the range of issues aired during the fast-moving forum were immigration reform, media misinformation, voter turnout next November, the unpredictable effect of third-party candidates and the as-yet undelivered promise of rank-choice voting. 

On the subject of K-12 public education, he delivered a deeply sincere reminder not to underestimate the current generation – a statement that also applies to the tomorrow makers in Penn College's classrooms and labs.

"We need to empower students to see themselves as being in control of their futures."