Chair/Discussant Comments and Questions Panel 6.8: The Pilot National Asian American Political Survey: Preliminary Results and Methodological Issues Christian Collet University of California, Irvine AND Pacific Opinions An Independent Research Company Irvine, California Prepared for the Annual Meeting of the Association of Asian American Studies March 28-April 1, 2001 Toronto My comments on the Pilot National Asian American Political Survey, or PNAAPS, will proceed in three specific areas. The first will focus on the survey’s methodology, with emphasis on sampling, interviewing effects, question wording and other areas. The second will revolve around the findings and conclusions drawn by the authors. Finally, I offer four suggestions for broadening the scope and power of PNAAPS. I conclude with a brief comment about the representational role of public opinion in American democracy and the importance of the survey method as means for establishing more effective representation for – and giving greater voice to – Asian Americans nationally. I. Comments and Questions About PNAAPS Methods In one of the opening phrases of their paper, Professor Lien and her colleagues note, “…[t]o our best knowledge, neither is there an opinion survey on Asian Americans that is publicly accessible and adopts more than one non-English ethnic language.” The PNAAPS is, thus, both an historical accomplishment and long overdue, coming 15- 20 years after the first national studies of African Americans by Katherine Tate (first conducted in 1984, updated in 1996) and the first studies of Latinos by Rodolfo de la Garza and his colleagues (1992). What makes PNAAPS such an important project is its effort to draw a random sample of Asian Americans nationally for the purpose of understanding how the community views politics. The days of relying on exit polls, out- of-date, state-level data based on small sample sizes (e.g., Cain, Kiewiet and Uhlaner 1991), or pooling separate ethnic surveys with varying measures and taken at different intervals are over. PNAAPS has redefined, and will continue to define, the way in which we study and understand Asian American politics. Along with boldness and excitement, being on the research frontier also carries its challenges. As the authors emphasize at the beginning of their paper, “The survey is called a pilot project for no study of this nature and scope has been conducted in the U.S. before.” The authors mention several limitations to their work in the early pages of their