From Publishers Weekly
America's blighted inner cities enjoyed a renaissance in the 1990s, with crime rates plummeting and employment, real estate values and population all rising for the first time in decades. The credit for the turnaround, according to this absorbing study of urban revitalization, belongs to local community organizations, whose David vs. Goliath fight against red-lining banks and insurance companies, all-devouring real-estate developments and neglectful city halls helped preserve and revitalize their neighborhoods. Von Hoffman, an academic and the author of Local Attachments: The Making of an American Neighborhood, studies urban disaster areas such as the South Bronx, where housing activists helped transform burned-out ruins into flourishing neighborhoods, and South Central Los Angeles, where an influx of hard-working, entrepreneurial Latino immigrants built a vibrant working-class community after the 1992 riots. His is a somewhat conservative brand of urbanism, favoring "the power of capitalism" over vast urban renewal schemes that, he says, often destroy the character of the areas they're meant to revitalize. Hope for cities, he argues, lies not in glitzy stadiums and civic centers or giant public-housing projects, but in smaller-scale public-private partnerships, subsidies and tax incentives that encourage local landlords and mom-and-pop businesses, the motor of inner-city revitalization. Urban development policy is a labyrinth of heavily acronymed programs, regulations, community groups and government agencies, but von Hoffman's lucid narrative, with its colorful activists, Machiavellian politicians and inspiring struggles, brings this potentially mind-numbing subject to life. This book deserves to be read by everyone concerned with the fate of America's cities. Photos.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Review
"Von Hoffman's lucid narrative, with its colorful activists, Machiavellian politicians and inspiring struggles, brings this potentially mind-numbing subject to life. This book deserves to be read by everyone concerned with the fate of America's cities."--Publishers Weekly
"An upbeat book about the contemporary state of inner cities in the United States sounds like an oxymoron. But Harvard University faculty member Alexander von Hoffman has written such a book. It is persuasive and educational as well as counterintuitive.... Von Hoffman is no dewy-eyed optimist. He understands that the revitalizations he chronicles are only a start, that millions of inner-city residents across the nation live in misery. But with von Hoffman's proof that individuals can make a significant difference, he promotes realistic hope."--Steve Weinberg, Baltimore Sun
"It all started on Charlotte Street in the Bronx. Presidents Carter and Reagan stood on that street and both compared the area to bombed-out London and Berlin. House by House, Block by Block recounts how New York City rebuilt the South Bronx and large parts of Brooklyn and Harlem, and how other cities have transformed their own troubled neighborhoods. I marveled at the accuracy and intimacy of the reporting. The chapter on New York is superb: I was there, and the revitalization occurred just as von Hoffman describes." --Edward I. Koch, former mayor of New York City
"This is the most hopeful book on the American inner city to appear in decades. Von Hoffman's surprising optimism rests on an impressive base of new research and data. But most importantly, he has gone beyond theories and statistics to the neighborhoods themselves to tell the dramatic story of how an unexpected coalition of community activists, foundations, planners, politicians, and business leaders have defied immense difficulties to begin rebuilding America's inner cities 'house by house, block by block'." --Robert Fishman, author of Bourgeois Utopias: The Rise and Fall of Suburbia, and Professor of History, Taubman College of Architecture and Planning, University of Michigan
"This book arrives at the perfect time, just as faith in the American city is being renewed and governments and foundations are trumpeting the rebirth of the metropolis. Von Hoffman's research reminds us of a valuable lesson: it is the tireless work of those unsung heroes at the grassroots--residents, community builders, block club leaders and the like--who will ultimately determine whether our policies and prescriptions work or fail. House by House, Block by Block is required reading, for both participants in and observers of the revitalizing of the American city." --Sudhir Venkatesh, author of American Project: the Rise and Fall of a Modern Ghetto, and Associate Professor of Sociology, Columbia University
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