James J. Connolly is Assistant Professor of History, Ball State University, Muncie, Indiana.

• * Introduction * Politics and Society at the End of the Nineteenth Century * The Dimensions of Progressivism * The Politics of Municipal Reform * The New Urban Political Terrain * James Michael Curley and the Politics of Ethnic Progressivism * Ethnic Progressivism Triumphant: Boston Public Life in the 1920s * Epilogue * Statistical Appendix * Selected Primary Sources * Notes * Index

The Triumph of Ethnic Progressivism is absolutely ‘must reading’ for anyone interested in Progressive Era municipal reform or ethnocultural politics. At the very least, it is the best history to date of that crucial period in Boston’s history, as well as an excellent model for similar studies of other major cities during the same era. The sections that focus on what Connolly dubs a ‘ground-level analysis’ of Boston politics are exceptionally well constructed, exhaustively documented, and cogently presented. Viewed in a wider perspective, the author has succeeded in challenging almost everything we thought we knew about Progressive Era municipal reform and in constructing a provocative new paradigm to encompass the mass of the data informing existing interpretations… It is fair to say that any scholar worth his salt has an intellectual obligation to test his own theories against those proffered by Connolly.

James J. Connolly is Assistant Professor of History, Ball State University, Muncie, Indiana.

• * Introduction * Politics and Society at the End of the Nineteenth Century * The Dimensions of Progressivism * The Politics of Municipal Reform * The New Urban Political Terrain * James Michael Curley and the Politics of Ethnic Progressivism * Ethnic Progressivism Triumphant: Boston Public Life in the 1920s * Epilogue * Statistical Appendix * Selected Primary Sources * Notes * Index

The Triumph of Ethnic Progressivism is absolutely ‘must reading’ for anyone interested in Progressive Era municipal reform or ethnocultural politics. At the very least, it is the best history to date of that crucial period in Boston’s history, as well as an excellent model for similar studies of other major cities during the same era. The sections that focus on what Connolly dubs a ‘ground-level analysis’ of Boston politics are exceptionally well constructed, exhaustively documented, and cogently presented. Viewed in a wider perspective, the author has succeeded in challenging almost everything we thought we knew about Progressive Era municipal reform and in constructing a provocative new paradigm to encompass the mass of the data informing existing interpretations… It is fair to say that any scholar worth his salt has an intellectual obligation to test his own theories against those proffered by Connolly.

James J. Connolly is Assistant Professor of History, Ball State University, Muncie, Indiana.

• * Introduction * Politics and Society at the End of the Nineteenth Century * The Dimensions of Progressivism * The Politics of Municipal Reform * The New Urban Political Terrain * James Michael Curley and the Politics of Ethnic Progressivism * Ethnic Progressivism Triumphant: Boston Public Life in the 1920s * Epilogue * Statistical Appendix * Selected Primary Sources * Notes * Index

The Triumph of Ethnic Progressivism is absolutely ‘must reading’ for anyone interested in Progressive Era municipal reform or ethnocultural politics. At the very least, it is the best history to date of that crucial period in Boston’s history, as well as an excellent model for similar studies of other major cities during the same era. The sections that focus on what Connolly dubs a ‘ground-level analysis’ of Boston politics are exceptionally well constructed, exhaustively documented, and cogently presented. Viewed in a wider perspective, the author has succeeded in challenging almost everything we thought we knew about Progressive Era municipal reform and in constructing a provocative new paradigm to encompass the mass of the data informing existing interpretations… It is fair to say that any scholar worth his salt has an intellectual obligation to test his own theories against those proffered by Connolly.