This book explores and critiques the process of spatial regulation in post-war New York, focusing on the period after the fiscal crisis of the 1970s, examining the ideological underpinnings and practical applications of urban renewal, exclusionary zoning, anti-vagrancy laws, and order-maintenance policing. It argues that these practices were part of a class project that deflected attention from the underlying causes of poverty, eroded civil rights, and sought to enable real estate investment, high-end consumption, mainstream tourism, and corporate success.

Contents

Introduction 1.The Betrayal of the Liberal Assumptions of Urban Renewal 2. The Failure of Urban Renewal as a Spatial Ordering Apparatus 3. Times Square: New York’s Most Disorderly Place 4. Neoliberalism, Neoconservatism, and Spatial Regulation 5. Graffiti as a Manifestation of Social Disorder 6. The Declining Appearance of Order, 1978-1993 7. The Radicalization of Spatial Regulation, 1994-2001. Epilogue: The Legacy of Displacement and Exclusion

Author Bio

Themis Chronopoulos is Assistant Professor of History at the State University of New York, Stony Brook.