tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6148895566137990424.post5874303388648289428..comments2024-01-29T21:57:46.033+00:00Comments on Sociology in My Neighborhood: DC Ward Six: What is Neoliberalism? Is there Neoliberalism in Ward 6?Johanna Bockmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08212564448840979369noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6148895566137990424.post-74016028170096509712011-07-21T18:16:48.732+01:002011-07-21T18:16:48.732+01:00An important reason to introduce neoliberalism int...An important reason to introduce neoliberalism into political discussions in the US is that it highlights the enormous ideological, political, and economic overlap between our two political parties. There are significant differences between the Ds and the Rs, but there is an enormous consensus about a neoliberal future. Even if, in the end, you choose neoliberalism-D or neoliberalism-R, by seeing these parties as two flavors of neoliberalism rather than as ideological opposites, you can at least consider some real opposites to neoliberalism, like syndicalism, market socialism, state socialism, radical democratic socialism, participatory budgeting, and many alternatives that haven't even been imagined yet.AZnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6148895566137990424.post-16309507410306953492011-07-21T17:58:27.289+01:002011-07-21T17:58:27.289+01:00Thanks, Eric, for pointing out the SE location of ...Thanks, Eric, for pointing out the SE location of The Yards. One can see neoliberalism in The Yards because 1) 700 households in Capper-Carrollsburg public housing just a couple blocks away were moved out under Hope VI to make way for the mixed-income housing and 2) neoliberalism has a lot to do with deindustrialization, which meant the reduction in employment in Ward 6 (probably a long time ago) for the working classes and allows for the current transformation of industrial properties from production into high-end housing and park space (sociologist Sharon Zukin talks about how this happened in the NYC loft scene).<br /><br />I'll have to look into the numbers of privately owned dwellings (rental apartments? rental houses? owner occupied houses? owner occupied condos?) destroyed in the most recent urban renewal because I just know about the 1950s urban renewal. New forms of urban renewal do incorporate state-owned buildings (such as public libraries in many cases, but also the larger project of Dept of Transportation in SE), as well as state-regulated mixed income housing, into large-scale development projects with international investors. The conversion of low-rent privately-owned dwellings into higher-rent privately-owned dwellings is part of neoliberalism too.<br /><br />In the end, the neoliberalism idea seems to capture a feeling of a lack of hope for the future among the "precariat." For example, Hope VI seems to offer improved housing, but the reality has been that the poor have been pushed out and on the whole not allowed to return.Johanna Bockmanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08212564448840979369noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6148895566137990424.post-64697606350564010572011-07-20T18:03:08.645+01:002011-07-20T18:03:08.645+01:00The Yards is in SE, not SW. The yards is being bu...The Yards is in SE, not SW. The yards is being built on industrial land where nobody lived.<br /><br />I think you may be thinking of the "new" Southwest, where blocks of poor neighborhoods were razed to make way for urban renewal projects of federal office buildings and private housing.<br /><br />In fact, the urban renewal in that case was a top-down process driven by Congress and aimed at "helping" poor people out of the squalor of Southwest. In fact, with all the taking of private property for public purposes (with some redistributed to private purposes, too), it may in fact represent the opposite of neoliberalism.Ericnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6148895566137990424.post-27421120865692358072011-07-19T18:29:19.391+01:002011-07-19T18:29:19.391+01:00Thanks for this short but to-the-point explanation...Thanks for this short but to-the-point explanation of neoliberalism and how it could describe our city. Very interesting!Amy Hubbardnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6148895566137990424.post-22417354671642011052011-07-19T15:46:16.407+01:002011-07-19T15:46:16.407+01:00Great piece Johanna!Great piece Johanna!Monahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06907784402286773815noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6148895566137990424.post-83258393039011888302011-07-19T15:14:00.070+01:002011-07-19T15:14:00.070+01:00A friend wrote:
"Pretty concise. I would add ...A friend wrote:<br />"Pretty concise. I would add that in U.S. domestic politics, "neoliberal" has a narrower meaning, specifically referenced this week in Crooked Timber, Kevin Drum, and Yglesias, as a (largely) Democratic response to the perceived failures of interest-group liberalism of the New Deal." <br />I agree that neoliberalism is often seen either as a response to perceived failures of Keynesianism/New Deal or as a decades-long political rejection of Keynesianism/New Deal.Johanna Bockmanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08212564448840979369noreply@blogger.com