Detroit and Urban Crisis

Paper Summary:

In this article, the writer notes that as the industrial powerhouse that the United States was in the years of and immediately following World War II began to slow down in the 1960s, many of America's urban areas saw the economic base eroding with the disappearance of industry as well as the huge migration of Caucasians from the cities when the economies of the cities fell into decline. The writer discusses that the by-product of all of these occurrences was the fight to prevent racial integration of the suburban areas into which the Caucasians fled, and a swift decline of American cities. The writer looks at the city of Detroit that has been devastated over the years because of economic and racial issues. Such urban crises are the focus of this research. The research studies and cites the works of two pivotal writers on the topic in an effort to better understand the topic itself.

Outline:
Introduction
Historical Consequences of the Urban Crisis
Political Consequences of the Urban Crisis
Agreements/Disagreements
Conclusion

From the Paper:

"A brief history lesson of the socioeconomic history of Detroit is the best way to begin to understand the historical consequences of the urban crisis as well as what the crisis is in and of itself. During and immediately after World War II, the machine shops and automobile plants of Detroit, and as a result the other supporting businesses, were flush with cash because of the need for implements of war, during the war years of course, and the need for consumer vehicles after the war, as men and women returning from battle settled back into a state of normalcy and went on a buying spree in unprecedented quantities. Because of the proliferation of available jobs, Caucasians and African-Americans alike were able to gain employment; true, the racial inequality was existent, but it was not as acute or damaging at this point as it would eventually become. With the passage of time, however, the gap between the races was intensified by the power of capitalism, and the African-Americans of Detroit, as well as elsewhere, soon saw the economic and social gap between them and their racial opposites increasing to their disadvantage."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Solnit, Rebecca (July, 2007). Detroit Arcadia: Exploring the Post-American Landscape. Harper's Magazine.
• Sugrue, Thomas (1996). The Origins of the Urban Crisis: Race and Inequality in Postwar Detroit. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

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