The product of collaborative research spanning 8 years (2006–2014), Contested Transformation is a unique and highly ambitious book that applies an intersectional lens to political leadership in the United States, at the federal, state and local levels, focusing on elected women of color. Data from their underlying Gender and Multicultural Leadership (GMCL) Project allows Hardy-Fanta, Lien, Pinderhughes, and Sierra to describe “women and men who make up the nation's multicultural elected leadership and govern the country” (p. 7). Women of color “constitute an especially important part of the demographic change among the nation's political leadership” (p. 10), but also confront the “So what?” question, asking whether the election of women of color has, or has not, “advanced America toward a more inclusive democracy in the early twenty-first century and onward” (p. 11).

With this work, the authors fill a void within political science research which, overwhelmingly, has based its analyses of elected leadership on the experiences of White men. Those studies that did consider race generally framed racial concerns within a binary Black/White paradigm. The growing work focused on gender and elected leadership similarly tends not to disaggregate among women by considering differences in female office holding along racial lines. In addition, the bulk of the work in the field has focused on statewide and national office holders, with almost no focus on the sub-state and local levels, despite the fact that 96% of elected officials serve at the local level (p. 79). The authors point out, rightly, that their study is unique in that it is “comprehensive and comparative in scope, includes a national sample, and disaggregates findings by race and gender” (p. 11).

Because none of the data necessary to conduct this analysis were available, the authors constructed two unique datasets. The first, the GMCL National Database of Minority Elected Officials, comprises the universe of 10,160 Black, Latino, and Asian American elected officials in federal, state, and local offices during 2006–2007. From 2012 to 2014, the authors updated original data in a variety of ways, such as following elected officials who ran for higher office between 2006 and 2012. They then added contextual data linking Census information to each official's jurisdiction. The second dataset comprised their GMCL National Survey, a telephone sample of elected officials serving in state legislatures or local office in 2006–2007, with data updated in 2012–2014.

The care and thoroughness of the authors’ data collection are a reflection of the theoretical complexity they bring to their analyses. They are careful to point out that race and gender (or what they call race × gender) are not simply classifications, but rather “factors that interact in dynamic ways with historical and structural political conditions” so that “the whole (combination) becomes much more than the sum of its parts” (p. 13). They also discuss the complexities of defining race in their study, pointing out that race could be defined theoretically, historically, legally, administratively, structurally, or, as they find, methodologically (p. 21). Part of the incredible richness of this books stems from the authors’ willingness to question and discuss these “basic” categorizations that often are utilized with little conceptual clarity.

The book is divided into four parts. Part I, Transforming the American political landscape, looks at the extent to which the American political landscape has been transformed by the increasing number of elected officials of color. Chapter 1 provides the historical context for this question, providing an overview of the history of representation across groups and the effect of the 1965 Voting Rights Act and Immigration and Nationality Act. Chapter 2 looks at “Who Governs?” at the local level, providing an overview of elected leadership on the local level and making clear that most elected officials of color represent jurisdictions with fewer than 5,000 constituents. Chapter 3 provides a baseline portrait of elected officials in terms of their personal, political, and family backgrounds, finding that “women of color elected officials are significantly less likely to be disadvantaged in education and occupation, compared to both women in general and their male counterparts” (p. 15).

Part II, Paths to Political Office, explores how race and gender affect the paths elected officials of color follow into elected office. The authors find little support for pipeline theory or the role of political ambition, and mixed results in terms of the role that parties play in recruiting these candidates to run. They also look at the institutional factors that influence elections (e.g. single versus multi-member districts, term limits) and their impact specifically on elected officials of color. In Part III, Leadership, Governance, and Representation, the authors provide an intersectional analysis of leadership styles, governance, and representation, finding that elected officials, both women and men, say that women elected officials “work harder, are better at building consensus, avoid the limelight to get the job done, and are more persuasive and more transparent when developing public policy” suggesting that “gender does matter in how elected officials engage in the policymaking process within their governing bodies” (p.17). Chapters in this section explore aspects of “political incorporation” for these elected officials and the degree to which elected officials “match” their constituents on key aspects of representation. Part IV, Advancing Democracy in the United States, looks at elected officials’ respective policy positions and the implications there may be for multi-racial coalition building across the elected officials (and their constituencies) discussed in the book.

Even before this book was published Hardy-Fanta, Lien, Pinderhughes, and Sierra enjoyed well-earned scholarly reputations, with backgrounds spanning research in race, ethnicity, and gender. Combining talents in this ambitious tome, they offer an empirically detailed and nuanced portrait of elected officials in the United States, painting a long-overdue, multi-dimensional portrait of elected women—especially women of color, who have been nearly invisible in more than a century of political science literature. For these reasons, Contested Transformations has to be considered an essential new research guide and foundational reference for further study of the politics of race, ethnicity, and gender.