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The historical experience of Latino communities is marked by segregation, poverty, and discrimination. Through a critical understanding of the effects of cultural, economic, and governance processes on urbanization patterns, placemakers start to reverse these effects in the contemporary moment. This chapter presents an account of the challenges, opportunities, and agents of change in the three historical periods of pre-Second World War, post-war, and in contemporary Latino communities, with a focus on Mexican Americans in the US Southwest. As with black communities in the South, for decades urban planning facilitated the segregationist management of Latino neighborhoods and proceeded unabated through the control of land use, discriminatory practices, and resistance to Latino social mobility. Latinos over the years have been victims of the “barrioization” of their communities: the effect of policies and processes of domination by the mainstream non-Latino white society resulting in the formation of residentially and socially segregated Latino neighborhoods. Communities fought back through grassroots movements that created local civic institutions—such as community development corporations—that have been instrumental in resisting marginalization and subordination, and critical in refocusing and channeling policy to the specific needs of neighborhoods. To resist barrioization, Latino communities have engaged in “barriological” practices that recreate and re-imagine “dominant urban space as community-enabling place.”4 In other words, through a variety of tactics—many of them informal—and social actions, Latinos have reclaimed spaces that at best were insensitive to their cultural needs, and at worst, were designed to disenfranchise.

Scholarship on Latino communities in the United States has yet to catch up with the rapid growth of this ethnic population in the country. Understanding the Latino urban experience and developing plans to better respond to both the needs of Latino communities and their integration within society is not only relevant, but also urgently necessary. Using the city of Los Angeles as a main lens, in addition to a general look at the urban Southwest, we contribute to the scholarship on the subject with a review of literature on Latino communities. We structure the review as an assessment of the various challenges and opportunities for urban Latinos in the pre-war, postwar, and contemporary city. Focusing on space, culture, economy, and governance, we chart the various roles both the private and public sectors play in meeting these challenges. Our reading of the literature shows that particular government actions in the economic and governance domains in the past had positive impacts on Latino integration, and we call for a similar effort today in addressing contemporary challenges. We conclude by suggesting that future planning scholarship on Latino communities engage the wider urban studies literature, focus on emerging forms of urbanization, and call on planners to sustain increased academic and practical interest in the topic.