Structural Racism and Social Change: New Orleans and Beyond

1
Structural Racism and Social Change New
Orleans and Beyond

• john a. powell
• Williams Chair in Civil Rights Civil Liberties,
  Moritz College of Law. Director, Kirwan Institute
• March 12, 2007

2
AGENDA

• Structural Racism (SR)
• SR Implications Katrina
• SR Implications Beyond
• Concluding Thoughts
• Additional Information on SR, Rebuilding New
  Orleans, and beyond

3
Structural Racism

• Racism, and the factors producing and sustaining
  it, have been theorized in many different ways.
  Primary among these are
• Individual
• Institutional
• Color-blindness
• The inadequacy of these models for describing and
  understanding the complexity of racialized
  operations of power has continually resulted in
  failed diagnoses and responses.

4
Structural Racism

• INDIVIDUAL
• This perspective suggests that the individual
  subject acts independently and consciously of
  his/her own volition to perform a racist action
  (a.k.a. discretionary).
• Problems
• Suggests that racism must always be rooted in
  intention,
• Often figures the subject as acting irrationally,
  that is out of synch with the majority cultures
  understanding of race and racism.
• Often by framing race as a historical and extinct
  phenomenon which obfuscates its contemporary
  materiality, ideology, and structure.

5
Structural Racism

• INSTITUTIONAL
• Institutions are organizations, or mechanisms of
  culture, governing the behavior of social
  subjects. Institutions are identified with a
  social purpose and permanence, transcending
  individual human lives and intentions, and with
  the making and enforcing of rules governing human
  behavior.
• An institutional racism framework suggests that
  despite the individual intentions of actors,
  social institutions (including education,
  religion, kinship structures, punitive systems,
  and economic forms) produce outcomes that are
  specifically racialized.
• Benefits Recognizes that a subject acts not only
  as an individual, but as a socialized person in a
  racialized culture. Accordingly, attention can be
  given not only to overt acts of individual
  racism, but also the covert racialized operations
  of institutions which are so normalized, they
  often seem undetectable.
• Problems Cannot account for the ways is which
  neutral institutions work in conjunction with
  other institutions to produce racialized
  outcomes.

6
Structural Racism

• Color-blindness
• Devised as a response to racism, a
  color-blindness perspective suggests that race
  should not be a consideration in interpersonal,
  representational, economic, or legal.
• Color-blindness, as a philosophy, is deeply
  rooted in the liberal tenet of the universal
  subject and is therefore often understood as the
  epitome of just and neutral policy.
• It has taken on a particular resonance is the
  post- Civil Rights Era in which de jure
  discrimination was eliminated to argue against
  programs such as affirmative action.
• Problems fails to account for the ways in which
  neutral policies (de jure) are mapped onto a
  historical legacy of racial discrimination
  creating de facto disparity which often operates
  far more covertly.

7
A Structural Racism model attempts to account for
the theoretical shortcomings of traditional
models
SOURCE Bonilla-Silva, Eduardo (1997)
8
Structural Racism

• How do we understand racial disparities if they
  are not explained by personal discrimination or
  explicit laws and policies?

• Structures are sets of mutually sustaining
  schemas or relationships and resources that
  empower and constrain social action and that tend
  to be reproduced by that social action. (Sewell)
• Structural racism is an analytical approach which
  examines the interrelationship among institutions
  as well as individuals for generating an
  understanding of the (re)production of unequal
  and hierarchical racial outcomes. An
  analytical-practical by-product of this approach
  is a call for institutional alignments through
  strategic interventions and an emphasis on
  analytical-practical monitoring because of the
  dynamic reality of what is at stake.
• To reiterate, structural racism is both a model
  for understanding the reality of how racism
  functions and way to refigure necessary
  intervention.

9
Structural Racism

• Shifting attention away from individuals, SR
  focuses on the way in which outcomes are
  racialized. When outcomes such as student
  achievement, wealth accumulation, health factors,
  etc. are disparate along racial lines, it is
  evidence that singular institutions and the
  interactivity between institutions are
  functioning in a racist mode, regardless of
  intent. Often, racism is not even perceivable
  within a singular institution, but rather
  operates across multiple domains to distribute
  disadvantage. De facto disadvantage is often
  produced even when there are no laws that are
  specifically racialized. De facto disadvantage
  then often results from the historical legacy of
  discrimination, making racism a very dynamic and
  potent force in the present. Racialized outcomes,
  interactivity between institutions, and
  historical legacies of discrimination, all
  represent covert operations, making the
  structural racism more difficult to diagnose.
  Structural inequalities limit the democratic
  process.

10
Structural Racism

• Considerations for an SR Response
• In order to respond to the network of power
  shaping structural racism, the interconnecting
  relational web within which individuals live and
  act must be investigated and articulated.
• Within this network characterized by the
  fragmentation of power, multiple levels of
  leadership that cut across fields and borders
  must be identified and mobilized.
• This indicates a need to consider the larger
  relationship between opportunity structures and
  institutional inequities.
• Including people where they once were excluded is
  a step in the right direction, but it is not
  enough. We need to examine the policies and
  politics which led to their exclusion in the
  first place.

11
Structural Racism

• An SR approach assumes public policies,
  institutional practices, cultural
  representations, and other norms work in various
  and interactive ways reinforcing and perpetuating
  racial group hierarchical inequalities.
• An SR analysis has a two-fold emphasis,
  understanding and intervention, and FIVE
  defining characteristics
• Interrelated functioning of institutions
• Call for a strategic and dynamic understanding of
  these interactive cumulative relationships
  (single to complex)
• A shift of focus from individuals to raced groups
• Strategic interventions that challenge the
  collective routine actions of individuals
  interacting within a set of normal institutional
  arrangements.
• Relevance of monitoring.

12
Structural Racism

• Necessity/Importance of an SR approach
• An SR approach importance and necessity derives
  from its broadening and grounding of individual
  and institutionally-based explanations without
  disregarding them. It brings us closer to an
  understanding of reality because of its
  theoretical generality and methodological
  inclusiveness which cannot be stated for solely
  individual and institutionally-based explanations.

13
Structural Racism

• Necessity/Importance of an SR approach
• It forces us to look at results, not necessarily
  intentions. Intentions need to be considered in
  a relational way.
• Policies neutral on their face and intent, can be
  discriminatory in their effect.
• Institutional and public arrangements are not
  neutral in their impact and influence our private
  choice and resources.
• Laws and institutions need not be explicitly
  racist in order to disempower communities of
  color they need only to perpetuate unequal
  historic conditions.
• People usually make reasonable choices given
  their constraints and opportunities, but these
  constraints and opportunities are unevenly
  distributed racially.
• We need to consider these constraints in order to
  understand the limitations placed on those
  choices.

14
Structural Racism

• Necessity/Importance of an SR approach
• Current disparities are symptoms of structural
  racism.
• Nevertheless, it is only analytically possible to
  underscore SR when isolated from individual and
  institutional racism this is not because SR is
  only present when the other two are absent, but
  because in their absence we are required to
  sharpen our analytical skills in order to
  understand racial disparities.
• Simply recognizing disparities is not enough, we
  need to examine our assumptions surrounding them.
  
• Inequality is built into our current
  institutional arrangements.
• Disparities are not a sign that the current
  system isnt working, they are a sign that it is
  working exactly as it is supposed to because it
  eschews any consideration of interrelated
  institutional effects, in general and group-wise.

15
Structural Racism

• Necessity/Importance of an SR approach
• An SR approach proposes evaluating the fairness
  of structures or institutional arrangements by
  how they function in themselves and their
  relationship with other structures and
  institutions in society and human agency.

16
SR Implications Katrina

• The Challenge 1
• More than one year after Katrina, Gulf Coast
  recovery still requires tremendous assistance and
  progress has been slow.
• Many issues continue to slow recovery (some
  examples)
• Funds not reaching communities in need
• Housing funds not reaching homeowners in need
• Long term federal commitment to Category 5 levee
  system uncertain
• Continued housing crisis in New Orleans
• Citys population much lower than what was
  expected
• Continued displacement for nearly ¼ million
  residents

17
SR Implications Katrina

• The Challenge 2
• Despite the great need in the Gulf for additional
  assistance, concerns exist regarding the nations
  focus on Gulf Coast recovery.
• Public attention
• The public does not see progress in the Gulf
  Coast recovery and feels significant funds have
  been expended, but does not fully understand why
  recovery has been slow.
• Media attention
• After significant press coverage near the
  anniversary, national news coverage of the Gulf
  Coast has diminished significantly.
• News cycle moving onward (mid-terms, political
  scandals, international affairs).

18
SR Implications Katrina

• The Challenge 3
• Why this disconnect and concern about public
  support?
• Media emphasis on waste in spending and size of
  Katrina relief package (larger than any other
  disaster response).
• Common public beliefs
• Gulf Coast recovery should only cost 200
  billion.
• There is a popular perception that the 109
  billion largely goes to the city of New Orleans.
• There is a general assumption that much of those
  dollars support longer-term recovery and
  reconstruction
• When in fact, the bulk of the early supplemental
  funds provided much-needed emergency housing and
  other aid to families and support to provide
  clean up and other emergency activities.
• Lastly, there is often an assumption that these
  allocations go directly to the cities and states
  though a large portion of the federal allocations
  are actually administered by the federal agencies.

19
From Editorial Desk of the Wall Street Journal
(August 29, 2006)

• The post-Katrina spend-fest in Louisiana will be
  remembered as one of the greatest taxpayer wastes
  in US history.
• New Orleans plight is not the result of federal
  underspending. Uncle Sam has spent five times
  more on Katrina relief than any other natural
  disaster in the past 50 years.

20
SR Implications Katrina

• Reframing the Debate 1
• Concern that this can endanger long term federal
  commitment to the Gulf.
• Closing window of opportunity to learn from
  Katrinas national implications.
• Need to reframe arguments to build greater
  support for the Gulf Coast.
• Not just a natural disaster, but a disaster
  produced by failed policy.
• Implicating not just the Gulf, but everyone.

21
SR Implications Katrina

• Reframing the Debate 2
• Not just a Gulf Coast (New Orleans) concern,
  impacting everyone.
• Katrinas impact was not a geographic anomaly,
  but the result of heightened vulnerability
  created by neglectful policy.
• These same policies have created conditions of
  vulnerability in many places throughout the
  nation.
• Creating the potential for future Katrinas.

22
SR Implications Katrina

• A Failure of Policy Infrastructure
• The impact of Katrina must be viewed as a failure
  of public policy, primarily the result of our
  nations disinvestment in the key infrastructure
  needed to support our society.
• Physical infrastructure Allowing critical
  physical infrastructure to decay (leveesroads),
  while wasting infrastructure investments in
  undeveloped areas.
• Social infrastructure Cuts to critical social
  programs to help connect people to opportunity,
  stabilize low income neighborhoods.
• The result of this neglect has created conditions
  of extreme vulnerability in many urban
  neighborhoods (racialized vulnerability).

23
Disinvestment in Critical Infrastructure for
Urban Areas

• Katrina directly illustrated the national trend
  of disinvestment in critical infrastructure for
  urban areas
• Poorly maintained levy systems
• Insufficient public transportation

24
SR Implications Katrina

• Physical Infrastructure
• The American Society of Civil Engineers rates the
  nations infrastructure investments, maintenance
  and quality at a Grade of D or Poor (Source
  2005 Infrastructure Report Card for the Nation).
• U.S. infrastructure requires an investment of
  1.6 trillion every 5 years to maintain its
  capacity.
• Only 2 of the annual national budget is
  earmarked for infrastructure spending therefore,
  funds are continually short.
• The Army Corps of Engineers currently has a
  backlog of uncompleted projects costing 58
  billion and spanning ten years.

25
SR Implications Katrina

• Disinvestment in Critical Infrastructure for
  Urban Areas
• These trends are not unique to New Orleans and
  occur in many communities in a variety of ways
• Disinvestment in public transit, in favor of
  expenditures on highways and roads.
• Policies that promote sprawl in suburban areas,
  while stripping urban areas of investment.
• Declining federal resources for urban areas,
  despite the great need to maintain existing
  infrastructure in our cities.

26
SR Implications Katrina

• Social Infrastructure
• While general conditions of economic stability
  are growing worse for many Americans, many of the
  safety net programs (critical social
  infrastructure) in the United States have been
  diminished.
• Social safety net cuts in the most recently
  proposed Congressional Budget
• Medicaid cut by 16 billion over next 10 years
• More burden for Temporary Assistance to Needy
  Families shifted to states (estimated to cost
  more than 8 billion)
• 343 million cut for foster care
• 11 cut in Community Development Block Grant
  funding to cities
• Annual housing cuts for 2006
• 134 million cut to public housing funding in
  2006
• Elimination of 35,000 section 8 vouchers

27
A Failure to Invest in Ourselves

• A failure to invest in the social capital of our
  citizens so that they can grow to be contributing
  members of our society.
• This parallels failure to invest in our
  neighborhoods and communities.
• You can not expect returns without a willingness
  to invest capital.

Post Katrina Graffiti in New Orleans
28
SR Implications Katrina

• Producing Extreme Social Vulnerability
• This disinvestment and neglect has created
  conditions and neighborhoods of extreme
  vulnerability in many of our cities, this has
  national implications.
• A 2002 United Nations Development Programme
  report defines social vulnerability as
• the degree to which societies or socio-economic
  groups are affected by stresses and hazards,
  whether brought about by external forces or
  intrinsic factorsinternal and externalthat
  negatively impacts the cohesion of a country.

29
SR Implications Katrina

• Policy Framework for Change
• A renewed call for
• Responsible government
• Government action that is responsible and
  responsive to everyone, especially our most
  vulnerable populations and neighborhoods.
• Embracing policies that affirmatively work to
  connect vulnerable populations to opportunities.
• Investment
• Recommitment by the federal government to
  reinvest in our nations critical physical and
  social infrastructure.
• Producing benefits far beyond the Gulf Coast.

30
SR Implications Katrina

• Linked Fates Coalition Building
• The Institute has been working with the National
  Alliance to restore Opportunity to the Gulf
  Coast.
• To raise the call for more responsible
  government, government which does not create
  conditions of vulnerability and promotes social
  mobility.
• For the Gulf Coast and the nation
• Work at this stage
• Op-ed placements
• Faith based organizing
• Collaboration with local organizations, media
  attention
• Research, white papers, public information
• For more information http//www.linkedfate.org

31
Beyond New OrleansStructural Racism and
Strategic Interventions

• What are Strategic Interventions?
• Points of pressure where collective action is
  needed (specific and general impact).
• Points of pressure where we realized the need to
  think about our linked fate for long-term and
  lasting change.
• How do we identify Strategic Interventions?
• We need to identify the Veto Players/Relevant
  Actors needed for transformative change.
• Furthermore, we need to also know who occupies
  these power positions for determining which power
  lever would have more impact (transformative
  power) acknowledging the resources at-hand.
• Keep in mind that transformative change takes
  time and energy.

32
Beyond New OrleansStructural Racism and
Strategic Interventions

• What are the implications of an SR understanding?
• Need to realize (and think of) that institutional
  arrangements create racialized patterns.
• Need to make visible these racialized
  arrangements and realized their
  socially-constructed nature (i.e., they are not
  inevitable).
• Need to be aware of not falling into a localist
  perspective.
• Need to be aware of the importance to build a
  movement (capacity).
• Need to be aware of the necessity to locate the
  relevant players/actors.

33
Housing Thompson v. HUD

• Intervention Litigation-based intervention to
  link Baltimores public housing residents to
  communities of opportunity.
• Status In remedial phase, case was originally
  filed-in.
• Actors Maryland ACLU, Legal Defense Fund NAACP,
  plaintiff class of 14,000 public housing
  residents, and also involves coalition of local
  and national advocates.

34
Housing Thompson v. HUD

• Plaintiffs propose providing desegregative
  housing opportunities in the regions high
  opportunity neighborhoods to remedy HUDs fair
  housing violations
• with the goal of providing nearly 7,000
  affordable housing opportunities in high
  opportunity communities to public housing
  residents who volunteer to relocate in ten years.
• Aligned with proposals to provide support
  services for residents who volunteer for the
  program.

35
Housing Thompson v. HUD

• Structural Racism Component
• By affirmatively connecting residents to
  opportunity structures such as high performing
  schools, safe neighborhoods, and employment in
  the Baltimore region, the remedy will improve the
  life outcomes of participants. In addition, the
  remedy will allow new possibilities for
  redevelopment in Baltimores distressed inner
  city neighborhoods.
• Lessons Learned
• Litigation approach is both time and resource
  intensive
• Anticipate impediments
• A coalition of local organizations is
  collaborating to provide support services to
  Thompsons participants and working to anticipate
  and void resistance from suburban residents.

36
Moving Forward Proposed Solutions

• To address these inequities, we propose
  equity-based regionalism
• An equity-based, structural approach that
  emphasizes the region as the primary geographic
  unit determining the distribution of opportunity
  and resources.
• Equity-based regionalism focuses on KEY
  opportunity structures.
• Equity-based regionalism re-conceptualizes these
  structures and relationships not just for people
  of color, but for ALL residents of a region.
• Without re-conceptualizing these structures and
  relationships everyone will come up short.

37
Linked Fate

• Why should those living in inner-ring, outer-ring
  suburbs, and exurbs care about inner-city
  disparities?
• A region and all its residents share a linked
  fate.
• This issue is particularly important today.
• To thrive, regions must be competitive in the
  global economy.
• Regions cannot compete with wasteful and
  redundant services, and fragmented governments.
• Research suggests that regions who utilize
  regional policies are economically (and socially)
  healthier.

38
Addressing Racial Tensions

• In order to move forward and address the our
  nations racialized poverty and economic
  insecurity, we must raise awareness and address
  the racial tensions which initially created
  inequities.
• We must use race as a transformative bridge, to
  improve conditions for all.
• Race should not be used as a divisive phenomena,
  as it historically has been used.

39
Coalition Building

• We need to recognize our connectedness and
  develop and implement solutions that benefit ALL
  members of society.
• Linked-fate
• Targeted Universalism
• This cannot be done in isolation
• Need diverse coalitions
• Connect with community based organizations,
  social justice groups, local governments, the
  business community, CDCs, philanthropic
  institutions and large urban institutions (e.g.
  universities).

40
A New Paradigm

• Through collective imagination, we need to define
  what the future should look like A New Paradigm!
• Explicitly stated goals and principals provide a
  common framework through which to pursue justice.
• What is our alternative vision?
• A model where we all grow together.
• A model where we embrace collective solutions.
• Where race is experienced and addressed in a
  different way.
• No longer using race to divide and distract from
  class struggle.
• Using race to transform our society in a way that
  lifts up all people.

41
Concluding Thoughts

• What has Katrina taught us?
• That race and poverty are intricately
  interconnected in our society.
• Illustrated the fragile state of our low income
  urban communities.
• Revealed our shared fate, Katrina impacted the
  entire nation.
• The response to Katrina will impact us all.

42
Concluding Thoughts

• What has Katrina taught us?
• Demonstrated the inadequacy in resources devoted
  to meeting the needs of our inner city
  communities.
• Levies and inadequate transit in New Orleans.
• What is lacking from your community?
• Indicated strong need for responsible
  government (Being a good Social Citizen).
• Responsible to the people, especially the most
  sensitive populations.

43
Concluding Thoughts

• The obstacles we face can seem insurmountable.
• Nevertheless, through a new paradigm and with
  coalition building we can make great strides in
  addressing the race and class disparities in our
  nation.
• Strategic transactional change, can ultimately
  accomplish transformation.
• Eyes on the prize(s)!
• Remember- We Have, and Can Make Progress!

44
www.KirwanInstitute.org
45
Additional Information on SR, Rebuilding New
Orleans, and beyond.
46
Commitment to New Orleans?

• Pledges to rebuilt Levies at Hurricane 5 strength
  remain unfulfilled.
• Large parts of the City remain without
  electricity and have limited public services.
• Almost all schools remain shut down.
• Displaced residents soon will lose housing
  assistance
• Demolition of the homes of the displaced soon to
  begin, limited protection from eviction.
• The Citys plan for redevelopment offers little
  guidance, support and assistance for displaced
  residents those who want to return.
• A Laissez-faire approach to bringing back New
  Orleans?

47
Core Principals for New Orleans and Beyond

• Develop and support safe, livable communities
  that are connected to opportunities.
• Provide sufficient financial resources to the
  entire region, while doing no harm to critical
  social programs.
• Create an accountable and equitable regional
  approach- include public participation that
  assures effective political voice.
• Ensure that the comprehensive public and
  environmental health and safety needs of the
  region and its residents are met.

48
Core Principals for New Orleans and Beyond

• High quality educational opportunities are
  critical to the health of a region and its
  residents.
• Create a long term economic development strategy
  that produces an equitable, thriving, and
  sustainable economy.
• Economic development strategies must also support
  local wealth creation and asset building.
• Redevelopment must assure that equitable physical
  and social infrastructure is provided to all
  communities in the region.

49
High (Dark Colors) and (Light Colors) Low
Opportunity Neighborhoods in New Orleans
50
Economic Wellbeing
Economic Well Being Rankings (out of 331
metropolitan regions)
City-Suburban Disparity Ranking (out of 331
metropolitan regions)
Data Lewis Mumford Center
Well being is determined by household and per
capita income, poverty , professional status,
unemployment, home owners and vacant housing
51
Conditions for the African American Community

• In respect to the overall condition of the
  African American community, the New Orleans
  region rates poorly.
• Of the 21 largest regions
• New Orleans recorded the 4th worst conditions for
  African Americans.

52
Lessons From Katrina SR Implications
53
The Challenge

• What did Katrina illustrate? What problems are we
  trying to address in our communities, regions and
  society?
• Two related problems
• Extreme racial segregation and extensive racial
  disparity.
• Declining opportunities for everyone, declining
  regions, stagnation and decline of the middle
  class.
• These problems reinforce each other.

54
Lessons From Katrina

• What has Katrina illustrated?
• The Profound Connection Between Poverty and Race.
• Growing Economic Insecurity for Middle and Low
  Income Americans
• Regional Inequity
• Result of Policies and Structures that Produce
  Poverty and Segregation
• Sprawl, School Conditions, Subsidized Housing,
  Investment Disparities
• Segregation from Opportunity
• Moving Forward and Proposed Solutions

Storm Survivors in New Orleans Photo from
Katrinahelp.com
Storm Survivors in New Orleans Photo from
Combined Federal Campaign of the National Capital
Area
55

• "Almost all of them that we see are so poor, and
  they are so black."Wolf Blitzer, on CNNs
  Situation Room

56
Race and Class

• Hurricane Katrina illustrated the profound
  connection between race and poverty in the US.
• Public awareness was collectively focused on the
  abandonment in New Orleans along lines of race
  and poverty, and images reinforced disparities in
  a way that numbers could not.
• New Orleans, and the nation are now experiencing
  a second disaster with declining public support
  and retrenchment.

57

• It is important to recognize that other
  communities of color were also disproportionately
  affected by the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina,
  including Vietnamese, Mexicans, Hondurans and
  other communities of color.

Source Tides Foundation- Race Poverty The
Katrina Imperative
58
The Link Between Race and Class

• What is the link between race and class?
• Racialized structures and policies have created
  the extreme correlation of race and poverty in
  our urban areas.
• People then assume that only those harmed or
  isolated are people of color.
• In reality, these effects are far reaching and
  impact everyone (shared fate).
• Also harming Whites living in opportunity poor
  communities.
• And causing regional distress, harming everyone
  in the region, even the elite.

59
Growing Economic Insecurity

• Conditions of economic insecurity were
  highlighted by Katrina
• Poverty is increasing
• Decline of the middle class
• Continuing conditions of economic insecurity,
  lack of health insurance, increased bankruptcy
  and housing cost increases will continue to
  propel these trends.
• Historically, the decline of the middle class has
  triggered a misplaced racialized response
• we can not repeat this mistake.

60
Is the Safety Net Being Pulled Away?

• While general conditions of economic stability
  are growing worse for many Americans, many of the
  safety net programs in the United States have
  been diminished.
• Social safety net cuts in the most recently
  proposed Congressional Budget
• Medicaid cut by 16 billion over next 10 years
• More burden for Temporary Assistance to Needy
  Families shifted to states (estimated to cost
  more than 8 billion)
• 343 million cut for foster care
• 11 cut in Community Development Block Grant
  funding to cities
• and annual housing cuts for 2006
• 134 million cut to public housing funding in
  2006
• Elimination of 35,000 section 8 vouchers

Source National Low Income Housing Coalition and
Center on Budget Policies and Priorities
61
Will the Safety Net for New Orleans be Withdrawn?

• Despite numerous pledges to rebuild New Orleans
  and help Katrina survivors, little redevelopment
  is occurring and federal/public support is
  withering.
• The Citys plan for redevelopment offers little
  guidance, support and assistance for displaced
  residents those who want to return.
• A Laissez-faire approach to bringing back New
  Orleans?

Months after Katrina, the Ninth Ward Remains
Devastated
62
Racial Inequity

• These regional inequities also correlate with
  extensive racial inequities.
• People (and neighborhoods) most impacted from
  Katrina were more likely to be African American
  and impoverished
• In New Orleans, nearly 80 of the population in
  flooded areas were African American
• Incomes were nearly 1/3 lower in flooded areas
• and 1 out of 3 displaced African Americans were
  in poverty.

Source Brookings Institute
63
Gender and Hurricane Katrina

• In the aftermath of Katrina, much necessary
  attention was paid to issues of race and class
  while little focus was placed on the gender
  implications.
• Where there is race and class, there is always
  gender. Class always has a gender class always
  has a family structure. Race always is gendered,
  and gender is always racialized.
• Professor Zillah Einstein, Katrina and Her
  Gendering of Race and Class, 2005

64
Women and Hurricane Katrina

• A large number of the homeless and displaced in
  Louisiana and Mississippi are women and their
  children.
• Households headed by women are now led by women
  without houses. To speak of poverty without
  mention of the intersection of gender only tells
  part of the story.

• Poverty is tied to contraceptive and
  reproductive rights, teenage pregnancy, lowered
  womens wages, and inadequate daycare and
  education.
• By not paying attention the effects of Hurricane
  Katrina on the lives of women in the Gulf Coast,
  reconstruction efforts will leave them and their
  specific needs behind.

AP/The Advocate, Richard Alan Hannon
65
Urban Calamities

• Hurricane Katrina is one of the largest natural
  disasters of modern time. Its scope and magnitude
  called national attention to the Gulf Coast and
  highlighted a myriad of governmental failures and
  other physical and social vulnerabilities that
  have plagued the region long before the onset of
  the Hurricane.
• A 2002 United Nations Development Programme
  report defines social vulnerability as
• the degree to which societies or
  socio-economic groups are affected by stresses
  and hazards, whether brought about by external
  forces or intrinsic factorsinternal and
  externalthat negatively impacts the cohesion of
  a country.

Source United Nations Development Programme.
2002. Draft final report Vulnerability and Small
Island Developing States. University of the West
Indies Centre for Environment and Development
66
Urban Calamities Continued

• Large-scale natural disasters are not the only
  events with devastating effects on urban areas.
• Social vulnerability is characterized by
  increased growth in criminal activities, growing
  rates of HIV/AIDS infection, growing rates of
  children dropping out of school, declining age
  of prison population, declining public health,
  rotting public infrastructure, and migration of
  skilled professionals. These occurrences are
  symptoms of negative social processes resulting
  in increased social vulnerability.
• Like the Gulf Coast, many of the continued
  problems facing American cities have devastating
  effects that stem from fiscal policies and
  structures.

Source United Nations Development Programme.
2002. Draft final report Vulnerability and Small
Island Developing States. University of the West
Indies Centre for Environment and Development
67
More on Disparities

• Disparities are important, but not a sufficient
  lens to understand the problems we face
• Disparities can be a divisive frame to address
  these issues.
• What is your point of reference?
• Disparities do not address the decline in
  regional health and the economic insecurity that
  impacts everyone.
• We need to not only address disparities, but grow
  opportunities for everyone.
• We need to not just set goals of racial parity
  with Whites but improve conditions for everyone.
• You can have less racial disparity if everyone is
  doing poorly (The Great Depression).

68
Racial/Regional Inequities Impact Everyone

• How do racial and social inequities impact
  overall regional health?
• Racial and regional inequities impact the health
  of the entire region, and impact everyone in the
  region.
• The segregation tax (excessive housing costs)
  paid by Whites to distance themselves from low
  opportunity communities.
• The region loses its competitive edge in the
  global economy.
• Inequitable schools that produce an unprepared
  (undereducated) labor force.
• Interregional economic competition that erodes
  the regions collective economic voice and power.
• Fragmented and redundant governments, underused
  and redundant infrastructure in suburban areas.
• An undercapitalized central city with declining
  infrastructure and resources.

69
A Failure to Invest in Ourselves

• Both at the federal, regional and local level,
  inequities represent a failure to be good social
  citizens.
• A failure to invest in the social capital of our
  citizens so that they can grow to be contributing
  members of our society.
• This parallels failure to invest in our
  neighborhoods and communities.
• You can not expect returns without a willingness
  to invest capital.

70
Racial Segregation and Concentrated Poverty

• Why were African American and poor neighborhoods
  impacted the most from Katrina?
• The dynamics of spatial inequity, combined with
  patterns of racial segregation.
• Flood risk in New Orleans was not equitably
  distributed and followed historical patterns of
  segregation in the City.

After levee breaks, the Ninth ward rapidly floods
in New Orleans. Photo by Ted Jackson/NEWHOUSE
NEWS SERVICE)
Evacuees sit stranded in the streets outside the
Convention Center of New Orleans in the aftermath
of Hurricane Katrina September 3, 2005.
REUTERS/SHANNON STAPLETON
71
African American Population in New
Orleans
72
Concentrated Poverty

• Why were most areas impacted by Katrina poor?
• New Orleans has some of the most severe levels of
  concentrated poverty in the nation.
• In respect to concentrated poverty, Milwaukee is
  not far behind New Orleans (ranking 9th
  nationally).

73
Effects of Policies and Structures

• These conditions of inequity and segregation are
  a result of racialized policies and structures
  that have also
• Promoted sprawl
• Led to disparities between schools
• Concentrated subsidized housing
• Exacerbated disinvestment in critical
  infrastructure for urban and inner-city areas
• As a result of these structures and policies,
  many people are segregated from opportunity in
  New Orleans (and most metropolitan areas).
• Opportunity Segregation

74
Policies that Favor Sprawl

• Policies that promote sprawling suburban and
  exurban development exacerbate the isolation of
  inner city communities
• Pulling resources and people away
• Driving segregation and regional inequities
• Urban sprawl is an example of a phenomenon that
  impacts both regional health and heightens racial
  disparity/segregation
• Diminishes opportunity for everyone

75
Sprawl In New Orleans

• Sprawling development (and suburban flight) are
  evident in New Orleans
• Between 1982 and 1997
• The New Orleans region lost 1.5 of its
  population, but its urban land increased by 25.
• This development has destabilized inner city
  communities, furthering their isolation.

Source Brookings Institute and Sierra Club
76
Concentrated Subsidized Housing

• Affordable housing policies also work to create
  social/racial isolation and promote concentrated
  poverty.
• Policies which have concentrated subsidized
  housing in impoverished, racially concentrated
  inner city areas.
• Exclusionary zoning that keeps out most
  affordable housing in growing affluent suburbs.
• These trends are evident in New Orleans.

77
The Correlation of Poverty and Subsidized
Housing in New Orleans
78
Disinvestment in Critical Infrastructure for
Urban Areas

• Katrina highlighted the national trend of
  disinvestment in critical infrastructure for
  urban areas
• Poorly maintained levy systems
• Insufficient public transportation

79
Disinvestment in Critical Infrastructure for
Urban Areas

• These trends are not unique to New Orleans and
  occur in many communities in a variety of ways
• Disinvestment in public transit, in favor of
  expenditures on highways and roads.
• Sprawling development that pulls resources away
  to newly developing areas.
• Declining federal resources for urban areas.
• Despite the great need to maintain existing
  infrastructure in our cities.

80
Inequities in Transportation Policy and Spending

• As witnessed in the aftermath of Katrina, public
  transportation is critical to low income
  households.
• Nearly a 29 of African Americans in New Orleans
  had no access to a vehicle.
• Many were trapped with no viable way to leave the
  city during the storm, or no viable way to reach
  employment prior to the storm.
• Despite the desperate need for public
  transportation, government expenditures always
  favor highways and private auto travel.
• For every 100 spent on highways, Louisiana spent
  17 on public transit.

Katrina Survivors waiting for transit to leave
the superdome.
Source U.S. Census and Sierra Club, Sprawl
Report 2001
81
Most Severely Flooded Areas were Transit
Dependent African American Neighborhoods
Transit Stop Destroyed by Katrina
82
Sprawling DevelopmentWho Pays for New
Infrastructure?

• Development in the suburbs and exurbs create
  tremendous costs for the public sector.
• Schools, water and sewer, fire and police
  protection, roads and sidewalks, parks and other
  public services.
• Research in Oregon has found that that average
  new home costs the public sector 33K in
  infrastructure costs.

83
Declining Federal Resources for Urban Areas

• Many of our urban areas have depressed tax bases
  due to population loss, vacant properties and job
  losses.
• While urban communities have diminished capacity
  to meet their needs, they often have the highest
  demand for public services
• High poverty neighborhoods, maintaining critical
  regional infrastructure (downtown), high-need
  schools, and old existing infrastructure that is
  at the end of its life cycle.
• While need is growing, federal support is
  declining
• As evidenced by federal cuts to critical urban
  programs
• housing, community development etc.
• Between 2003 and 2004, federal grants to
  Milwaukee County decreased by 15.6, representing
  a loss of over 290 million.

Source U.S. Census Bureau, Inflation Adjusted
Dollars
84
Effects of Policies and Structures

• What are the cumulative effects of these policies
  and structures?
• Opportunity segregation
• Social Isolation
• Limited access to opportunity structures
• Creation of high and low opportunity communities
• Often coexisting with severe racial disparity
• What are opportunity structures, how do we define
  and measure opportunity?

85
Defining Opportunity
86
Opportunity Structures

• Individuals exist within this interconnecting
  relational web of opportunity structures.
• Opportunity structures are the resources and
  services that contribute to stability,
  advancement and quality of life.
• Opportunities are distributed geographically-
  inner city residents are walled off from
  opportunities.
• Thus, where you live is as important as what you
  live in!

87
The Dynamics of Opportunity in New Orleans

• These trends of opportunity exclusion are evident
  in the New Orleans region.
• Low opportunity neighborhoods in New Orleans
• Were more likely to be African American
  neighborhoods
• Were more likely to be flooded
• How will these neighborhoods be rebuilt?
• Will they be high opportunity communities or
  replicate pre-Katrina inequities?

88
High (Dark Colors) and (Light Colors) Low
Opportunity Neighborhoods in New Orleans and
Flooded Areas (Red)
89
Other Structural RacismIntervention Examples

• Education
• Choice is Yours (Minneapolis)
• Health Care
• SEIU/MAC West (Chicago)
• Resources/Infrastructure
• Fix it First (Michigan)
• Multi-racial coalition-building
• Texas 10 Percent Plan
• K-Mart Unionization (Greensboro, NC)

90
Education The Choice is Yours, School Mobility
in Minneapolis

• Intervention School mobility program designed as
  part of a remedy to a school funding adequacy
  case.
• Status Despite initial problems attracting
  participants, the program is widely popular now
  with students (and inner city students are
  performing as well as their suburban counterparts
  in their new schools).

91
Education The Choice is Yours, School Mobility
in Minneapolis

• Background
• The Choice is Yours is a school choice program
  for families qualifying for free or
  reduced-priced lunches who live in the City of
  Minneapolis.
• The program allows students to access suburban
  public schools as well as magnet schools (and
  provides transportation).

92
Education The Choice is Yours, School Mobility
in Minneapolis

• Structural Racism Component By connecting
  students to low poverty suburban schools, the
  program remedies the economic and racial
  segregation facing inner city students and
  impacting their educational outcome.
• Lessons Learned
• Issues of Scale The program is successful, but
  its reach is limited (impacting 2,000 students).
  What happens to the 43,000 students left behind?
• Linking Interventions The program could be more
  impactful if linked with the regions housing
  mobility program (which is currently being
  pursued), thereby expanding the scope/scale of
  the intervention.

93
Health Care SEIU, MAC West and Hospital
Disinvestment in Chicago

• Intervention Organizing an advocacy initiative
  to stop hospital closures and patterns of
  disinvestments in hospitals located in
  communities of color.
• Status Initiative successful in stopping a
  hospital closure on Chicagos south side.
• Actors MAC West (faith based social justice
  coalition) and SEIU (labor advocates).

94
Health Care SEIU, MAC West and Hospital
Disinvestment in Chicago

• Working collaboratively with Service Employees
  International Union (SEIU), MAC has worked on a
  successful campaign to address the undermining of
  a significant anchor institution.
• Their work identified racialized redlining by
  Advocate in their spending and investment
  patterns
• the coalition is now advocating for a Community
  Reinvestment Act style of health care legislation
  for IL.

95
Health Care SEIU, MAC West and Hospital
Disinvestment in Chicago

• Structural Racism Component Hospitals are
  critical anchor institutions with wide spread
  implications for their nearby neighborhoods,
  impacting economic opportunities and also the
  availability of health care (and likelihood of
  finding primary care physicians) in these
  communities of color.
• Lessons Learned
• The power of coalitions by linking social
  justice/faith based advocates and union
  organizing advocates, the initiative was able to
  build upon the strength of both groups to
  successfully lobby to stop the planned closure.

96
Resources/Infrastructure Fix it First
(Michigan)

• Intervention Reversing the historical trends of
  public sector disinvestment in critical
  infrastructure for Michigans urban areas.
• Status Although some resistance was encountered
  initially, the program is still continuing and
  fewer resources are being spent to promote
  sprawling suburban growth.
• Actors Social justice, smart growth, and
  environmental advocates (and the State Governor).

97
Resources/Infrastructure Fix it First
(Michigan)

• Background
• Advocates lobbied for the States new Governor to
  reform the States spending patterns on key
  infrastructure that discriminated against urban
  areas, while promoting sprawling growth and
  development
• The Governor was able to enact the policy quickly
  as an executive order.
• Resulting in the Fix it First Transportation
  Policy The state of Michigan has reprioritized
  transportation spending to refocus support into
  existing infrastructure and expansion projects
  have been put on hold as repairs to existing
  roads are prioritized first
• 19 suburban transportation projects were canceled
  as part of the initiative.

98
Resources/Infrastructure Fix it First
(Michigan)

• Structural Racism Component Changing
  infrastructure spending patterns not only brings
  resources back to urban communities but also can
  impact urban sprawl (slowing the primary source
  of disinvestment in urban areas).
• Lessons Learned
• The power of coalitions Once again a coalition
  with unusual allies (social justice advocates and
  environmental advocates) was instrumental in
  promoting change.
• Grabbing the lowest hanging fruit on the tree
  The intervention worked to create policy change
  quickly by identifying a potential political ally
  and action that could be implemented easily via
  an executive order (i.e., creating policy change).

99
Texas 10 Percent Plan

• Intervention Re-thinking admission procedures
  and requirements followed by Texas public
  universities. By law, every high schools top
  10 senior students are automatically guaranteed
  enrollment to Texas public universities (one
  vote by a White-Conservative-Republican made the
  Plan possible).
• Status Currently being used and studies have
  shown that student quality has not been
  negatively affected. In addition, the students
  accepted through the 10 Percent Plan have
  attained higher GPAs than students accepted
  under the test-based criteria (i.e., before the
  10 Percent Plan).
• Actors Latino legislative leaders, Civil Right
  activists, grass-root organizers, and scholars.

100
Texas 10 Percent Plan

• Structural Racism Component The strategic
  intervention entailed a re-thinking (or being
  able to see differently) what is taken for
  granted today with extreme repercussions for life
  prospects test-based criteria for university
  acceptance. A simple shift (that took a great
  amount of effort) to accepting all top 10 senior
  students, became inclusive across racial and
  socioeconomic lines.

101
K-Mart Unionization (Greensboro, NC)

• Intervention Unionizing K-Marts distribution
  center at Greensboro, NC because these workers
  received the lowest salaries for comparable
  K-Mart jobs.
• Actors Distribution centers workers and The
  Pulpit Forum.
• Structural Racism Component Lower wages and less
  benefits for the same type of job within the same
  company. The only difference was that
  Greensboros distribution center was majority
  non-white, but it was also affecting those whites
  working there.

102
Texas 10 Percent Plan K-Mart Unionization

• Lessons Learned for both of these two examples
  Political Race The project of political race is
  a direct challenge to a White discursive
  structure. It does not depend on the
  substitution of another discursive framework,
  such as class-based inequality, but looks instead
  to the places where race, politics, culture, and
  economic intersect. Political race is not
  something you are its something you do. Its a
  decision you make. (107)

103
Lessons Learned From Example Interventions

• The power of coalitions
• All of the interventions required a coalition of
  groups (often of non-traditional allies) to
  create success, but resources are needed to
  create and support these coalitions.
• Different methods produce change
• Litigation based interventions are both costly
  and time consuming, other approaches may also be
  appropriate, such as influencing policy through
  executive decision (as was done in Michigan),
  public organizing (Chicago and Greensboro),
  legislative intervention (Texas), among other
  possibilities.
• Bringing interventions to scale
• By linking interventions (for example linking
  housing and education initiatives) in
  Minneapolis, a program can be more fully brought
  to scale and become more impactful.

104
Lessons Learned From Example Interventions

• Using interventions to catapult other
  initiatives
• Both the Chicago and Michigan examples provided
  spring boards to launch other advocacy
  initiatives (interventions).
• Expect and anticipate resistance and for
  structures to readjust
• Thompson provides a good example of an
  intervention designed to anticipate resistance
  and which is open to deal with changing
  conditions
• the remedy is intended to be goal based, not
  process based in order to adjust to the changing
  conditions in Baltimores housing market that may
  create re-segregation.

105
Some Recommended Readings

• Bonilla-Silva, Eduardo (1997). "Rethinking
  Racism Toward a Structural Interpretation."
  American Sociological Review, Vol. 62, No. 3
  (Jun.), pp. 465-480.
• California Newsreel (2003). http//www.pbs.org/rac
  e/000_General/000_00-Home.htm
• Cashin, Sheryll D. The Failures of Integration
  How Race and Class Are Undermining the American
  Dream. New York Public Affairs,2004.
• Feagin, Joe. Racism and the White Power
  Structure The Willie Horton and Sister Souljah
  Cases. In White Racism The Basics. New York
  Routledge, 1995.
• Goldberg, David, Racial Americanization,
  AmeriQuests, Vol. 1, No. 1, (2004).
  http//e