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An important aspect of postindustrial cities has been the development of large nighttime economies as downtown regeneration strategies. With this has come a shift in how urban nighttime spaces are regulated. This paper uses the case of the Lower East Side of Manhattan's nightscape to examine this shift in nightlife regulation. The nightscape first developed through a deregulation of liquor licensing that permitted a dense concentration of bars resulting in economic growth for as well as negative quality of life conditions within the area such as noise and litter. Rather than deal with these disorderly conditions as other forms of "broken-windows"-style urban regulation do, the new flexible nightlife regulation permits and effectively co-opts them as integral aspects of nightscapes and contemporary urban culture. In this paper I examine how the Lower East Side's nightscape was constructed through deregulation and how its current conditions are shaped by flexible regulation. The new nightlife regulation serves as a window for understanding the complex ways in which cities construct nightscapes and provides a new insight into the regulation of public space. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article draws from 49 qualitative interviews to explore the contextual antecedents of methamphetamine use in a sample of gay and bisexual Manhattan men. The paper distinguishes itself from the public health literature on crystal methamphetamine use in this population by shifting the analytic focus from individual-level factors of drug use to the role of social context. While individual-level factors—including self esteem and social awkwardness—are surely related to methamphetamine use, we argue that these factors arise in and are exacerbated by the normative interactional patterns and pressures of Manhattan's gay sexual subculture, which revolve around intensive and sustained sexual performance and sexual competition. Hence, we suggest there exists an elective affinity between Manhattan's gay sexual subculture and the use of methamphetamine—the latter which induces psychophysiological effects that help gay and bisexual participants negotiate the interactional pressures attendant to sexual sociality. In short, we highlight the relationship of Manhattan's gay sexual subculture to drug taking motivations, and, in turn, to unsafe sexual practices—i.e., the social conditions that put gay men "at risk of risk" of drug use and HIV infection (Link & Phelan 1995:85). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Chelsea, on Manhattan's Far West Side, with stunning speed became the center of Contemporary Art in New York City and the United States. In this paper we use the mega-concentration of commercial galleries in Chelsea as an opportunity to engage the long debate over the impact of the rise of the market and the decline of patronage as the major way that art is produced. Our seven-year study suggests that the situation was, and is, pluralistic and far more interesting than allowed by perspectives that just stress the dominance of commercialism in a one-dimensional way, or conversely by approaches that simply ignore the market's role. Economics is important but definitely not everywhere in Chelsea. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Heroin use among Manhattan arrestees interviewed by the Arrestee Drug Abuse Monitoring Program has remained steady around 20 percent- from 1987 through 2001. However, a theory of drug epidemics suggests the prevalence should have declined as the Heroin Injection Epidemic that peaked in the 1960s and 1970s drew to a final end and younger arrestees avoided heroin use. Indeed, black arrestees born since 1955 were much less likely to use heroin than those born 1945-54. Hispanic arrestees born since 1970 (but not those born 1955-69) were also less likely to use heroin suggesting that the decline in heroin use started among blacks before Hispanics. During the 1990s, sniffing replaced injecting as the predominant mode of heroin consumption for black and Hispanic arrestees, even among older arrestees. In strong contrast, the prevalence of heroin use among white arrestees did not decline in the 1990s and injection was still their most popular mode of consumption. Heroin injectors were more likely to be daily users, and consumed over twice as much heroin as their heroin sniffer counterparts. The paper highlights other differences in heroin use across race/ethnicity and modes of heroin consumption. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research has found that most bonus plazas in front of Manhattan office buildings are barren, uninviting spaces. But there has been little study of why that is so. Existing explanations suggest this is incidental to other causes-architects slavishly reproducing modernist architectural styles, or developers too cheap to build usable public space. Such explanations are found to be unsupported by the facts. This study of 291 Manhattan bonus plazas and the development process in New York, including site observations, analysis of newly available plaza data, and interviews of architects, planners, and building managers reveals that spaces were made uninviting intentionally, and that it was building developers who wanted the plazas to be inaccessible. Implications for the study and creation of public space are discussed. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents information on the rebuilding of Lower Manhattan in the U.S. The rebuilding of Lower Manhattan enhanced the value of classical American pragmatist model developed by W.E.B. Du Bois and others from Chicago School. The pragmatists used ethnographic studies on ecological structures of the city to classify race and class. The ethnographical studies also focused on the problems of racial stratification in urban life. In 1925, Robert Park and other sociologists presented a theoretical framework for urban ethnographic studies. Park clearly stated the elements that need to be considered to create sustainable work communities.

In 1989, the National Endowment for the Authors gave and then rescinded partial funding for an exhibit that dealt with the impact of AIDS upon the arts community of Manhattan. The exhibit was held by the gallery Artists Space and was entitled "Witnesses: Against Our Vanishing." The NEA chair claimed a number of reasons for removing the funding, including the idea that the show was deemed too political. Although the NEA reinstated the funding on the day the show opened, the controversy breached the tenuous trust between artists and the NEA and sparked a debate about the political character of the arts. That debate, along with related controversies, shaped subsequent cultural policy formation, including a shift away from funding individual artists. This paper examines this story with a focus of the surprising ways the controversy allowed the art world to influence political practices. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Vague democratic consensus on the Port Huron Statement's "root principles" was not enough to guide Lower Manhattan's post-9/11 civic renewal process to full completion. Though such a vague consensus was sufficient to get four cooperating civic renewal coalitions organized within days after 9/11, because of the urgency of the crisis, differences among leaders' views and values did not emerge in a timely way. These unacknowledged differences led to tensions that soon caused some leaders to drop out and others to support "least common denominator" strategies with less than optimal outcomes. Moreover, glossing over these differences hid a "diversity deficit" among leaders and participants. Such democratic civic renewal processes are complex, contentious, lengthy, and costly, including ten steps: (1) healing; (2) education; (3) civic participation; (4) collaborative visualization (5) formal expression in words and images; (6) community validation; (7) advocacy; (8) official adoption; (9) implementation; and (10) institutionalization. At various points in such ten-step time processes, leaders must apply theory-guided checks on their transformative efforts, including seeking validation from their civic participants. A braided theoretical rope that can guide feasible and desirable civic renewal processes includes: participatory and deliberative democratic theory, classical American pragmatism, and feminist standpoint theory. The leaders of the Civic Alliance to Rebuild Downtown New York and its member coalitions needed such a braided rope of social theories to guide them in working through all ten steps in the process of rebuilding the City after 9/11. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]