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While the conflagrations that took hold of the South Bronx in New York City from the 1960s to the 1980s and the widespread devastation that resulted focused attention on not only the US ‘urban crisis’ but also on the area’s potential for cultural resurrection and targeted economic development, the struggles of its immediate neighbours to the Northwest have received much less attention. What were the factors that stayed the arson ‘epidemic’ from consuming Northwest Bronx so that it retained some viability? While neighbourhood community organisation has been largely credited with this, and undoubtedly had a major impact, much less attention has been paid to the consequences of cheaply and cynically housing refugees from war-torn Southeast Asia, under a so-called resettlement programme, in the Northwest’s semi-derelict, unheated buildings. Here, perforce, they had no option but to survive and carry on their lives; survival can itself be a form of political resistance, one that does not easily submit to a premature resolution of the conflict. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article develops the concept of shoestring democracy as a way to characterize the resulting social relations of private governance structures embedded in two types of collective housing schemes found in New York City and the adjoining suburbs: gated condominium communities (gated condominiums) and market-rate cooperative apartment complexes (co-ops). Drawing from ethnographies of gated condominiums and co-ops in New York City and neighboring Nassau County, New York, we compare these two forms of collective home ownership regarding the impact of private governance structures on residents and their sense of representation and participation in ongoing community life. 'Shoestring democracy' encompasses a broad range of behaviors utilized to insulate residents from local conflicts and disagreements, and limits rather than promotes political participation. The greatest differences between the co-ops and gated condominiums were found in discussions of safety and security, in that condominium residents have developed an elaborate discourse of the fear of crime and others, especially racialized others, to explain why they moved to their secured communities. Co-op interviewees, on the other hand, generally felt a sense of safety in their buildings, often due to the gatekeeper effect of the co-op board and doormen. In gated communities, covenants, contracts, and deed restrictions (CC&Rs) guarantee that most problems are resolved before they start. While the same can be said for co-ops, interviewees find that these rules and regulations seem to mystify everyday governing practices for the average co-op resident. Moral minimalism and a lack of structural and procedural knowledge may insulate residents from local conflicts and disagreement, but also may discourage civic participation. Exploring the apathy residents expressed about participation and a lack of representation suggests that although the Rochdale principles of cooperation that are the legal and social basis for co-ops may have been important at one time, current practices of private governing boards do more to restrict participatory democratic practices than encourage them. The policy implications are outlined with suggestions of how to make homeowners associations and co-op boards more accountable and encourage greater adherence to the original co-op mandate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For Friedmann and Wolff, the citadel's physical form—physically defended enclaves in the global city—shapes relations between citadels and outsiders. Subsequent work claims that the designs of citadels produce simulated community life, exclude the city and sanitise public spaces. However, such claims have been based on relatively brief observations. This ethnography assesses the impact of design by examining the quintessential citadel of Battery Park City, in New York City, while the community mob ilised against plans for a highway tunnel bordering their community during redevelopment of the neighbouring World Trade Center site. Community life is robust. However, the influence of the physical design is borne out in previously unrecognised ways: residents are identified as a crucial new constituency promoting exclusivity in the global city. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the twentieth century, labour unions in New York City developed tens of thousands of affordable housing units that were targeted to the city's moderate income residents. Case studies of projects developed by Local 3 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers and Local 1199 of the Hospital Workers Union illustrate how union-backed housing reflected two significantly different conceptions of community. Local 3 represented the white, politically moderate and middle-income building trades; Local 1199's membership was primarily non-white, low-income service workers. Local 3's Electchester created a homogeneous and exclusive residential enclave in near-suburban Queens that was part of an array of benefits funded collaboratively with the union's employers. Local 1199's 1199 Plaza used public funding and resources to construct striking modern buildings in the low-income neighbourhood of East Harlem, with the goal of creating a community that was inclusive in terms of both its residents and its relationship to the neighbourhood. These different visions of community were based largely, although not entirely, on race. This article discusses the planning and development of the two housing projects, in the context of each union's conception of community - both its own, and its place in a broader physical, social and political community. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Find Your Classroom Voice Program has been offered at Kingsborough Community College for the past three years. Its purpose is to enable students who are consistently inactive in class discussions (and who might be called"classroom-specific social phobic") to develop the ability to take a more active rote in the classroom. With Its success, the Program hat attracted the attention of faculty members who hove expressed interest in learning how to conduct the Program in their own classes. The Program's Originator, with nearly two decades of experience as a practicing psychologist, has developed a five-session training program for interested faculty members. In the following article, he presents that training program along with the psychological principles upon which the Find Your Classroom Voice Program is based. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Developing community capacity to improve health is a cornerstone of community-based public health. The concept of community capacity reflects numerous facets and dimensions of community life and can have different meanings in different contexts. This paper explores how members of one community identify and interpret key aspects of their community’s capacity to limit the availability and use of tobacco products. Particular attention is given to examining the interrelationship between various dimensions of community capacity in order to better understand the processes by which communities are able to mobilize for social change. The study is based on qualitative analysis of 19 in-depth interviews with key informants representing a variety of community sectors in Harlem, New York City. Findings indicate that the community is viewed as rich in human and social resources. A strong sense of community identity and connectedness underlies this reserve and serves as a catalyst for action. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Provides an overview of the Chinese emigration from the Wenzhou region in the Chinese province of Zhejiang and the establishment of the Wenzhou community in New York City. Geography of the Wenzhou region; Tradition of culture and education in Wenzhou; Community organizations in the New York City Wenzhouese community; Wenzhouese business enterprises in New York City.

This article's case study of a Brooklyn, New York community organization examines community politics and education. Despite efforts to exert greater control over schools and education policy, inner city neighborhood groups often face an uphill battle. Unresponsive administrators, rigid adherence to union contracts, and political considerations by both local and centralized policy makers all stifle community input. Still, well-organized community groups able to exert pressure over substantial periods of time can move schools toward making needed reforms. Controversy concerning the school system's treatment of East Brooklyn minority children began in the 1950s, when thousands of Southern Blacks and Puerto Ricans migrated to the area. Conflict peaked with school wars in the late 1960s, which shut down the entire New York City school system for weeks at a time. East Brooklyn schools continued to experience racial discord throughout the 1970s.

Discusses a case of neighborhood decline, using the Bronx in New York City as example. Effect of the destruction of good housing through abandonment and arson on the borough; Elements that contributed to the destruction of the borough; Social and economic characteristics of the neighborhood in the area.

Abstract: This is an historical study of an early twentieth century political struggle regarding hospital reimbursement in New York City. During a period called the "Progressive Era" (1895-1915), administrators in the City's Comptroller's office sought to gain control over small, locally run community hospitals by dismantling the long-standing practice of flat-grant payments to institutions. Central office planners felt that these payments gave too much control to trustees. In its place, the Comptroller initiated a system of per-capita, per-diem reimbursement. Inspectors now judged for the institutions which services and which clients were appropriate for municipal reimbursement. From the perspective of the Comptroller's office, this change was an attempt to pul rationality into the system of municipal support for charitable institutions. From the perspective of trustees and community representatives. however, this change was a political attack on the rights of institutions and local communities to control their own fate. Within the context of the larger Progressive Era "good government" movement to centralize decision-making in the hands of experts who believed strongly in the efficiency of larger institutions, it was generally the smallest, most financially troubled community institutions which felt the brunt of these changes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article examines the contestation and construction of political identities in miniature, as they took place in New York City in a movement of labor holiday and holy ground away from May Day, which was observed at Union Square, and toward Labor Day, which was observed on Fifth Avenue. Upon closer inspection, the battle lines were not so simply drawn. This was neither a morality play in which agents of the state sought to beguile and bewitch the hapless and helpless workers nor was it an anti-morality play of how forms of domination were ineluctably reincarnated in various forms. The article sketches the context for the competing labor identities. It then examines the symbolic construction of Union Square and May Day as the space and time of both labor solidarity and internal struggle. This, in turn, is succeeded by a discussion of how the symbolic reconstruction of labor's holy day and holy ground signified and reinforced a change in the political identity of organized labor. It is argued that the separation of community life from political work life contributed to and reflected both the evisceration of radical labor identity and by extension the incorporation of organized labor into the political and social life of the U.S.

Much of the recent literature on poverty assumes that the social and spatial isolation of impoverished inner city neighborhoods contributes to the poor job prospects of their residents. In this case study we examine a neighborhood, the Red Hook section of Brooklyn. New York, in which there is a concentration of poor people living in close proximity to blue-collar jobs. However, few local residents hold local jobs in the private sector. A survey of local employers revealed that most Red Hook jobs were filled via social networks that exclude local residents. Local residents, particularly African Americans, often tacked the social capital - connections and references - needed to obtain these jobs. Further, many local employers considered Red Hook residents undesirable employees for a variety of reasons including "place discrimination" as well as racial discrimination. By contrast, public sector employers often preferred local residents, although their ability to hire them was limited by formal educational requirements. These findings lead us to question the efficacy of policies, such as "empowerment zones," that assume that bringing jobs closer to where poor people live will necessarily improve their employment opportunities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses characteristics of patient in short-term hospitals in New York City. The data are presented for each hospital ownership group serving the community at large. Enrollment for hospital care insurance rose from 56 per cent of the population in 1952 to 71 per cent in 1958. During the period 1950-1958 the average daily number of general care patients in New York City hospitals increased from 26,800 to 28,000, or 4 per cent. Wards have always admitted a lower proportion of non-residents than the private services of hospitals. Between 1933 and 1957 the proportion of aged in New York City's population rose from 4.5 to 9 per cent. Municipal hospitals have a higher proportion of aged than the wards of voluntary hospitals. Altogether public assistance recipients constitute one-fifth of all public charges in short-term hospitals. Four-fifth of all patient days paid for by government in New York City are therefore, in behalf of the medically indigent. In municipal hospitals the ratio of public charges to public assistance recipients is five and a half to one.

The article presents some aspects of the program of Rome State School for the preparation of mentally deficient children for community adjustment in Rome, New York. The philosophy of the school is to offer the finest institutional care and training for every patient enrolled. The essential parts of their rehabilitation programs include family care, colonies and convalescent care.