Priority Shift: The Fate of Mandatory Busing for School Desegregation in Seattle and the Nation.

Focusing on the experience of Seattle (Washington), this paper attempts to determine why school districts across the country have recently sought to de-emphasize segregation. Concerns about the validity of pursuing integration, particularly through busing, have been present throughout the history of school desegregation, but only recently is there a substantial withdrawal from mandatory integration policies. Following an introduction, Section II provides the contextual features of the study, and Section III discusses overarching issues of policy. Even though the federal courts and federal agencies played a large role in fashioning and enforcing this policy until the 1980s, there are wide variations in the implementation of the principles of Brown v. Board of Education, depending on local conditions and the local federal judge. Therefore, the Seattle case, considered in Section IV, illuminates the role that local dynamics play in desegregation policy. The most important factors in the recent retreat from integration are discussed in Section V, and the paper concludes in Section VI with speculations about the future of school equity policies and a consideration of the degree to which the country is returning to the era of separate but equal facilities. Recent court decisions, especially the conservative bent of the present Supreme Court, political mood, differing opinions among African Americans, and possible a general impatience with the time and money integration has cost, are all considered as possible factors in the trend away from busing. (Contains 4 figures, 5 tables, and 51 references.) (SLD)