Metropolitics

The Promises and Realities of Data-Driven Community Development

Austin Harrison — 2022-02-22T06:00:00Z

Tennessee nonprofit Innovate Memphis has spent nearly a decade designing the Memphis Property Hub, a public data platform for community development corporations (CDCs). Austin Harrison asks if this is a replicable way to democratize neighborhood- and property-level data, so as to level the playing field between community organizers and well-resourced state and market actors, and bring community organizing back to the fore of urban CDCs' activities.
Over the past decade, city governments and

- From the Field / data, open data, smart city, community-based organizations, community organizing, community development, housing, evictions, United States, Tennessee, Memphis

Community-Rooted Organizations: Enhanced Accountability and Capacity Building for Community Development

Camryn Smith & Danielle Spurlock & Aliyah Abdur-Rahman & Kay Jowers — 2020-07-10T05:00:00Z

Communities in Partnership, in Durham, North Carolina, uses a “community-rooted” approach to its work that leverages community residents' expertise and resources, as an alternative to “community-based” organizations that can marginalize community voice, limit capacity building, and neglect the underlying causes of community conditions.
Communities in Partnership (CIP), a nonprofit organization in Durham, North Carolina, addresses the structural barriers that impact low-wealth communities of

- Essays / community organizing, community development, capacity building, North Carolina, Durham (North Carolina), United States, community-based organizations, community-rooted organizations, systems change

Overcoming Decline Through Graffiti? The Case of the Open Space Gallery in Halle (Saale)

Nina Gribat — 2017-04-04T05:00:00Z

Open Space Gallery, a collective in Halle (Saale), Germany, turned the marginalized neighborhood of Freiimfelde into an open-air street-art gallery by painting the façades of vacant houses, improving the area's image—and, unintentionally, also its marketability. Nina Gribat examines how, following invitations by policymakers to participate in other projects, they have managed to walk the line between grassroots and mainstream action.
---- Series: Shrinking Cities Open Space Gallery (OSG;

- From the Field / Germany, urban regeneration, graffiti, urban decay, street art, community development, shrinking cities, Halle (Saale), makeshift urbanism, creative city, urban decline

The Arts as Fundamental—and Fragile—in Community Life

Andrew Zitcer & Julie Hawkins & Neville Vakharia — 2017-02-22T06:00:00Z

Arts funding in America mirrors the inequality found in society more broadly. Yet amid persistent poverty and other challenges, West Philadelphia residents assert that arts access and participation are central to their conception of a life well-lived. Andrew Zitcer, Julie Hawkins and Neville Vakharia discuss their research in West Philadelphia, noting the vibrant cultural production taking place there and maintaining that arts should be considered a fundamental right.
Amid the existential

- Essays / culture, United States, art, artist, arts, community, Philadelphia, community development, community arts

This is Not How it Ends: Post-Election Immigration Organizing in the United States

Folasade K. Famakinwa — 2016-12-07T06:00:00Z

In response to a tense post-election moment in the US, the Metropolitics editorial committee has initiated Rapid-Response Peer Review, with a commitment to quickly reviewing and publishing articles that examine organizing and activism around crucial urban issues. Our first call was for papers related to immigration policy. Below, Folasade Famakinwa reports on what US pro‑immigrant organizations and pro‑immigrant mayors are doing, urging them to deploy more prosocial programming to strengthen

- Essays / immigration, United States, elections, resilience, community development, sanctuary cities

Overcoming the “Scalar Stalemate” in Community Development

Evan Casper-Futterman — 2016-10-14T12:05:22Z

When urban practitioners undertake local projects, they are often working not only to achieve material gains in economically distressed neighborhoods but also to promote democracy, cooperation, equity, justice, and mutualism. Yet the existence of this strong set of counterhegemonic principles uniting community land trusts, cooperative enterprises, and credit unions also creates tension around the question of how to scale them up and increase their impact. In this essay, Evan Casper-Futterman

- Essays / community land trusts, community development, scale, cooperative enterprises, credit unions

Constructing Crises

Marla Nelson — 2015-02-23T05:50:00Z

A new book by Kevin Fox Gotham and Miriam Greenberg foregrounds the disturbing parallels between two seemingly distinct crises: Hurricane Katrina on the Gulf Coast and the 9/11 attacks in New York City. Marla Nelson reviews their arguments and asserts that activists can draw on the authors' insights—particularly their exposure of the importance of “crisis framing”—to advance visions of more just and inclusive urban redevelopment.
In the nearly 10 years since Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf

- Reviews / catastrophe, New Orleans, Katrina, disaster, recovery, United States, New York, crisis, resilience, Community Development Block Grants, private-activity bonds, community development