Place Matters
Metropolitics for the Twenty-first Century
Second Edition, Revised
Peter Dreier, John Mollenkopf, and Todd Swanstrom
December 2004
448 pages, 9 tables, 6 figures, 3 maps, 6-1/8 x 9-1/4
Studies in Government and Public Policy
Paper ISBN 978-0-7006-1364-9, $16.95
WINNER OF THE MICHAEL HARRINGTON AWARD
 New
edition of a classic. Three distinguished scholars challenge us
to put the urban crisis back on the national agenda, both as a moral
challenge to our conscience and an economic challenge to America's
prosperity and our families' pocketbooks. Focusing on the growing
concentration of poverty in our cities and older suburbs and the
mounting costs of suburban sprawl, they argue that these problems
have political origins and can thus be resolved through political
means--but only if we fully understand the power of place.
Despite modern telecommunications--faxes, linked computers, etc.--where
we live shapes our lives and fortunes as much as ever. Place affects
our access to jobs and public services (especially education), our
access to shopping and culture, our level of personal security,
the availability of medical services, and even the air we breathe.
Economic segregation is increasing in American metropolitan areas--the
rich and poor continue to move apart from one another. This has
devastating effects on those who are forced to live in areas of
concentrated poverty. But it also imposes costs, often unrecognized,
on middle class and rich families who in their effort to escape
the problems of concentrated poverty, undermine the quality of their
own lives by suffering the effects of unrestricted sprawl.
The central thesis of Place Matters is that economic
segregation between rich and poor and the growing sprawl of American
cities and suburbs are not solely the result of individual choices
in free markets. Rather, these problems have been powerfully
shaped by short-sighted government policies. The first order
of business must be to overhaul those policies. In the process,
both urban and suburban citizens will gain a keener awareness
that they are all ultimately bound by common interests and share
a common fate.
Not simply another polemic on the plight of the inner-city
poor, Place Matters provides a practical road map for
reform based on penetrating analyses of economic and demographic
trends, voting patterns, and congressional politics. While "sounding
the alarm," it also provides guidance and hope for elected
officials at local, state, and federal levels, as well as policy
makers, scholars, teachers, community activists, business leaders,
economists, social workers, and the urban clergy.
“A more level economic playing field for poor citizens of
cities and inner-ring suburbs isn’t just some liberal cause.
It’s critical to all Americans’ futures. To work, strategies
need to be federal, state, and metro-region wide. Place matters.
This book gets it, and lays out the basic arguments in brilliant
fashion.”--Neal Peirce, columnist, Washington Post
Writers Group and coauthor of Citistates
“An important book. Dreier, Mollenkopf, and Swanstrom have
creatively diagnosed one of the most important domestic problems
of the twenty-first century. This thoughtful volume is bound to
become a standard reference for students, scholars, and the lay
public who seek a broader understanding of the rising economic
segregation in our nation’s metropolises and how to confront
it.”--William Julius Wilson, author of When Work
Disappears: The World of the New Urban Poor
“This book is a tour de force. It not only shows how inequality
and place are inter-twined in the United States, it also provides
a sophisticated analysis for how to create a new metropolitan
politics. Packed with data and powerfully written, Place Matters
is essential reading for anyone interested in the fate of cities
and, more broadly, the future of American politics.”--Margaret
M. Weir, author of Politics and Jobs
“A brilliant and important piece of work. Deeply informed,
penetrating in its analysis of the problems of economic segregation
and spatial inequalities, and bold yet practical in its search
for solutions and proposals for reform. Place Matters is
one of the best books of applied social science I have ever read
and is certain to have a major impact on thinking and discourse
about urban problems over the next generation.”--Richard
DeLeon, author of Left Coast City: Progressive Politics
in San Francisco, 1975–1991
“With the publication of Place Matters, there may
be more reason to be optimistic about the future of cities. We
now have a fairly good idea of how we got where we are today.
And this book provides many of the substantive policy recommendations
and political strategies that can get us where most of us want
to go. . . . It is essential for any meaningful policy discussion.”--City
& Community
“Place Matters starts with a careful analysis of
the government policies that abandoned certain neighborhoods to
poverty and decay. Next, and more importantly, the book articulates
a vision of regional development with familiar recipes for success—expanded
tax credits, better child care, improved health care—but
that persuasively ties those into the very streets people live
in. Best of all, it’s readable.”--City Limits
“Deserves a broad readership. Dreier, Mollenkopf, and Swanstrom
have combined to write one of the strongest volumes on metropolitan
affairs in recent years, weaving together a wealth of contemporary
information, history, and refined analysis. They make a compelling
case for aggressive federal and regional action to alleviate poverty
and to reduce place-based inequity within and between metro areas.
. . . While this clearly written book will instruct readers with
limited exposure to the connections between place and class, experienced
metropolitan hands should also find the marshaling of evidence
useful and the arguments worthy of attention. . . . A superior
work .”--Urban Ecology
“No better summary exists of ‘progressive’ thinking
on urban policy. Highly
recommended.”--Choice
“If you’re looking for a handbook for the next Democratic
administration in Washington, read this book.”--East
Bay Express
“The authors of Place Matters argue, convincingly
and compellingly, that where one lives is a major factor in determining
one’s well-being and life chances. . . . The logic of their
argument is that place should join (not displace) race and class
as major organizing frameworks for analyzing the distribution
of life chances and the impact of public policy. . . . The strengths
of this book are many. . . . [It is] accessible not just to academically
trained social scientists, but also to public officials, policy
makers, and a broad range of citizens concerned with urban problems.”--Housing
Studies
“Place matters, and this volume offers a clear research
agenda for uncovering the answers to why income segregation and
its attendant problems plague center cities and their metropolitan
areas. The authors have uncovered a vast array of important empirical
questions that should inform the urban research community and
urban planners.”--Journal of Politics
“Place Matters is notable for its accessibility and
clarity. It is also a compelling narrative, demonstrating collective
and wide-ranging knowledge of the American city.”--Economic
Geography
“The authors of Place Matters make a refreshing point
of arguing against economic segregation using an economic argument,
recognizing moral and spiritual rationales for eliminating inequality
but engaging the debate squarely in their detractors’ home
territory. They make the case that economic segregation is bad
for society because poverty makes society less economically efficient.”--Social
Policy
“Very informative for anyone concerned about the future
of America’s cities.”--U.S. Mayor
“[A] useful brick in the wall of reform.”--American
Prospect
PETER DREIER, Dr. E.P. Clapp Distinguished Professor of
Politics and director of the Urban and Environmental Policy Program
at Occidental College, is coauthor of Regions That Work: How
Cities and Suburbs Can Grow Together and The Next Los Angeles:
The Struggle for a Livable City.
JOHN MOLLENKOPF is Distinguished Professor of Political
Science and Sociology and director of the Center for Urban Research
at CUNY Graduate Center. His books include A Phoenix in the Ashes:
The Rise and Fall of the Koch Coalition in New York City Politics,
The Contested City, and Rethinking the Urban Agenda.
TODD SWANSTROM is professor of public policy at Saint Louis
University. He is the author of The Crisis of Growth Politics:
Cleveland, Kucinich, and the Challenge of Urban Populism, the
coauthor of City Politics, and coeditor of Beyond the
City Limits.
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