Urban Neighborhoods in a New Era

Faced with the loss of their industrial base, American cities in the past have focused on fostering economic growth especially in downtown areas, with neighborhoods by contrast being virtually ignored. This situation is starting to change, and the purpose of In a New Era is to re-assess the place neighborhoods hold not only in contemporary urban politics, but in urban research as well.  Running through much of this research is a “narrative of failure” in which neighborhood concerns are consistently marginalized in the face of their structural disadvantages. Focusing on distressed neighborhoods in different types of North American cities—Baltimore, Chicago, Denver, Los Angeles, Phoenix, and Toronto—Clarence N. Stone, Robert P. Stoker, and their coauthors uncover the emergence of new trends in city-level policies and politics. When cities were in the early stage of transition away from the industrial era, pro-growth coalitions placed economic development in a privileged position and downplayed neighborhood concerns.  Today this once-entrenched policy pattern is breaking up in different ways across cities as key players are beginning to treat economic development and neighborhood improvement as complementary goals.  With organized business interests becoming less dominant, often more cooperative philanthropic foundations and the educational and medical sectors have become more prominent urban actors. While structural inequality certainly is still a factor, it has been, and can be, mitigated through strategically designed and institutionalized relationships. New policy practices—such as community benefits agreements and comprehensive community initiatives—may well signal a new era in which neighborhood concerns are being integrated and institutionalized into local policymaking.