Preface<br > ，t<br >Majority and Minority began in 1968 as a collaborative effort with C. Hoy Steele，<br >who was then a graduate student in American Studies at The University of Kansas.<br >Hoy and ] shared academic interests in the phenomena of race and ethnicity in<br >American life. We also shared a commitment to the realization of a society free<br >of ethnic and racial inequality and injustice--the dream of which Martin Luther<br >King， Jr.， so eloquently spoke. The sense of urgency with which we approached<br >the analysis of racial and ethnic relations was influenced not only by national<br >protest movements to end racial oppression but equally， and more directly， by the<br >racial tension and conflict that brought the community of Lawrence， Kansas， na-<br >tional notoriety. In both the first and second editions， we sought to emphasize the<br >practical--as well as theoretical--need for a more fundamental understanding of<br >the dynamics of racial and ethnic relations. We also were convinced of the irre-<br >levance of analysis and "understanding" that is not complemented by action to<br >alter existing systems of inequality.<br > Therefore， in both the first (1971) and second editions (1975)， we sought to<br >analyze the dynamics of American racial and ethnic relations from within the<br >context of a more general theoretical understanding of the broader field of majority-<br >minority relations. The basic assumption underlying both editions was that the<br >study of racial and ethnic relations should focus primarily on the patterns of dif-<br > ferential power and intergroup conflict. Emphasis on power and conflict in the<br > analysis of majority-minority relations was at that time not the primary thrust of<br > research in the field. For many years， the conventional wisdom among social<br > scientists dealing with issues of race and ethnicity was dominated by approaches<br > that ignored or underestimated the importance of conflict and power. It is perhaps<br > an instructive commentary on the state of sociological theory during the 1950s and<br > early 1960s that many of the most effective critics of mainstream approaches to<br > the study of race and ethnicity during the 1960s were social critics---often minority<br > group members--who stood outside the mainstream of the professional social<br > science disciplines. Articulate minority spokespersons were instrumental in graph-<br > ically demonstrating the role of differential power in maintaining a racist social<br > system and the presence of conflict as an inherent component of majority-minority<br > relations.<br > Our interest in power and conflict therefore led us to place strong emphasis<br > on sociological explanations of the dynamics of majority-minority relations. We<br > felt that the fundamental determinants of these situations are to be found in the<br > VII<br >