![\"cph.3a10455](\"https:\/\/journal.c2er.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/Tuskegee_Institute_-_faculty.jpg\")
<\/a>cph.3a10455 Tuskegee Institute faculty with Andrew Carnegie, Tuskegee, Alabama Shown from left to right, seated in front row: R.C. Ogden; Mrs. Booker T. Washington (Margaret James Murray Washington); Booker T. Washington; Andrew Carnegie; and an unidentified person.
1906 Frances Benjamin Johnston<\/p><\/div>\n
Traditionally, community development has\u00a0defined “place” as a urban neighborhood populated by disadvantaged low-income ethnic\/racial minorities. In the last issue, I argued that place-based community development strategies and initiatives invited a conflict between two goals (i.e. assimilation versus physical redevelopment of a neighborhood).\u00a0 The solution I advocated was to ditch “the place” and pursue assimilation-strategies and initiatives. That would seem to work well, so long as the target\u00a0population wanted to assimilate into mainstream America. But what if a sizeable percentage do not want to assimilate, or define\u00a0their personal assimilation\u00a0in such a way that mainstream America will not easily accept these entrants? The possibility also exists\u00a0that individuals may want the “characteristics associated with assimilation” (jobs, education, status, wealth, security etc.), but identify so strongly with a place-based culture that they\u00a0can enter\u00a0 mainstream society without conflict. Assimilation in such a context\u00a0becomes a\u00a0cul du sac.<\/p>\n
If so, “the place” the neighborhood threatens to evolve into\u00a0a residential prison–even if no one particularly intends it to be so. Growth is accommodated by simply building a larger prison–moving into an adjoining suburb or neighborhood for example. A self-reinforcing feedback loop\u00a0can result in behaviors and socialization,\u00a0which rightfully or wrongly results in\u00a0negative counter-reaction by\u00a0some in the\u00a0mainstream society (along the lines described in\u00a0Arnold R. Hirsch’s Making the Second Ghetto). While the argument can be made that such a counter-reaction is in fact discrimination or\u00a0outright racism, I’m not sure where that gets us. Actually, I do know where it gets us–right where we seem to be as a nation at the present time. We argue, talk past each other, moralize, and polarize (zero-sum solutions). We hope to solve it by elections–but I suspect that won’t work. What happens if ghettos can’t, or won’t, assimilate?<\/p>\n
The Perpetual Ghetto?<\/strong><\/p>\n Niagara Movement 1905 in Fort Erie Canada<\/p><\/div>\n In\u00a0essence, without effective and meaningful assimilation,\u00a0the ghetto becomes self-perpetuating, builds walls, and develops over time\u00a0its own culture and identity.\u00a0Its economy becomes more like a colony than a sub-set of the overall economic system. The ghetto can expand, it can even move, but “the place” remains–its resident population still locked into a fixed location. Sadly, the logic behind this line of thought is not easily dispelled, no matter how obnoxious it may be. If assimilation is rejected, or blocked, the “place” and the “identity” it provides becomes the focus whether one wants that or not. That’s how race enters the discussion about community development and “place”.<\/p>\n The issue I raise is whether African-American culture unequivocally\u00a0 embraces assimilation as\u00a0its ultimate goal–or is it divided. For those who prefer assimilation do they sense that assimilation as they define it is\u00a0desirable, but near-impossible? Do others simply\u00a0prefer for their own reasons\u00a0to live in a “place”\u00a0apart from the mainstream. Do others primarily\u00a0identify with a place, its heritage and identify,\u00a0and\u00a0the sense of\u00a0community it imparts? In all these cases assimilation breaks down. The residential prison bars become thicker. The world divides between those “in” and those “out”. The place can become a fortress for those on the inside\u00a0as well as a colony to those on the outside.<\/p>\n All this can be rather confusing because many studies have indicated that we are more “integrated”, i.e. have assimilated, more than ever before. Blacks have moved in droves, for example, into the former lily-white suburbs. Some of that movement \u00a0has been mislabeled as the “suburbanization of poverty”. This is a partially correct observation that ignores another reality which is that a large number of African-Americans may have indeed successfully assimilated into the mainstream society. Yet despite some hopeful signs of assimilation, I still see the\u00a0Sandtowns, Fergusons, NE and SE Washington DC (and a hundred other neighborhoods across the country)–and I realize the old-style ghetto persists.<\/p>\n What’s going on? Looking for a perspective that is sympathetic, but separated from today’s rhetoric, stresses\u00a0and correctness, I found my old standby–Bennett Harrison. \u00a0Writing \u00a0during another troubled time in our turbulent racial history (after the Sixties riots) Bennett Harrison, wrote an article, “Ghetto Economic Development”, that, I think can be profitably reread. The article raises questions and offers insight relevant to economic and community developers today. The basic question he\u00a0tackles is\u00a0whether assimilation into mainstream American society\/economy is\u00a0an unquestioned goal for African-American community development? Is the African-American economic development political culture divided on whether it wants assimilation on\u00a0mainstream terms–or any terms at all? If so, how does community development respond?<\/p>\n Bennett Harrison, “Ghetto Economic Development: a Survey”<\/strong><\/p>\n ( Journal of Economic Literature, Vol 12, No. 1(March 1974), pp. 1-37 and Published by American Economic Association\u00a0 http:\/\/www.jstor.org\/2721862)<\/p>\n After the civil rights movement, the Great Society, the urban riots of the 1960’s, and during the Nixon Thermidor, Harrison believed low-income Big City African-American neighborhoods\/ghettos economic\/community development followed two quite divergent paths. Each path reflected an approach made prominent\u00a0and respectable\u00a0by turn of the century Black intellectuals: Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. DuBois. \u00a0Each reacted, “spoke to”, their known environment and experience, and each advocated an approach for Blacks to achieve their desired end-goal. The two approaches, which he labels integrationist and separatist, seem relevant to contemporary economic\/community development. Harrison, a white intellectual, argues for a separatist path, and posits that path emerged dominant in the 1970’s. His article developed that theme.<\/p>\n Booker T. Washington<\/p><\/div>\n Booker T. Washington, America’s most influential\u00a0Black intellectual and leader in the period 1890 through 1915, advocated integration of African-Americans into the economic mainstream–parlaying that success into social and political equality. He was “the first national black spokesmen for economic ‘self-development’ … [advocating] ‘black capitalism<\/em>‘ [small business] in the belief that whites would accept blacks as equals only after the latter developed experience and expertise in orthodox business practice.<\/em>” (p. 2) His goal is congruent with “assimilation” of blacks into mainstream American society.<\/p>\n In 1895, Washington negotiated\u00a0his famous “Atlanta Compromise” calling for individual self-help, a black-relevant version of Horatio Alger that stressed ‘industry, thrift, intelligence and property’ (his words).\u00a0For him, education and entrepreneurship were\u00a0a surer path than directly challenging either Jim Crow laws or seeking political and civil rights. Washington, born a slave, reflected the 95% of American\u00a0blacks who at that pre-Great Migration time lived in the South.\u00a0He served as political advisor\u00a0to Teddy Roosevelt and William Howard Taft and founded the National Business League, the precursor of early black chambers of commerce. His long-term goal, of course, was to facilitate entry into the American economic mainstream that would eliminate political and economic inequality and attain civil rights.<\/p>\n His competitor (and rival) W. E. B. DuBois, born and raised\u00a0in Great Barrington, Massachusetts, was the\u00a0first African-American to\u00a0be awarded a doctorate (Harvard). In the middle\/late 1890s, he\u00a0taught history, sociology and economics at Atlanta\u00a0University.\u00a0Du Bois at first worked within the confines of the Atlanta Compromise–until 1905 when he co-led the famous Niagara Movement. The Niagara Movement\u00a0demanded political and civil rights for blacks as its highest priority–African-American political rights, not success of individual entrepreneurs was\u00a0his goal.\u00a0 In 1909\u00a0\u00a0he co-founded the NAACP to serve as the vehicle for that\u00a0change.<\/p>\n Washington bitterly and intensely opposed Du Bois until the\u00a0former’s death in 1915. The chief elements of Du Bois’ approach to community\/economic development were: “black separation, mutual cooperation, worker’s control, and economic planning”. He called it “socialism without nationalism”, advocating “Negro cooperative stores [that] would obtain their goods from Negro producers, which would be supplied raw materials from Negro farmers. Intermediate stages of production such as extractive industries and transportation were to be Negro controlled”. (p. 2). Why was Du Bois so determined to separate and develop a parallel “socialist” economy? Back then the metaphor used was “a colony”–and it was argued that African-American economy was a colony of the American “mainstream” economy. Du Bois wanted to achieve independence for American Black residential colonies.<\/p>\n The Ghetto as Colony<\/strong><\/p>\n Harrison’s treats the metaphor seriously, and presents evidence that residents and black activists bought into the metaphor as well. For example, Roy Innis, 1970’s chair of CORE [a self-acclaimed Garveyite] advocated that black ghettos become a political jurisdiction independent from the city jurisdiction whose relationship with the ghetto he described as “a sub-colonial appendage of the city”. Malcom X believed that the mainstream economy exploited ghettos in a characteristic colony-like manner:\u00a0 “whenever you take money<\/em> (i.e. profits) out of the neighborhood and spend it in another neighborhood, the neighborhood in which you spend it gets richer and richer, and the neighborhood in which you take it gets poorer and poorer<\/em>“(Harrison, p. 3). So-called “buy local” initiatives that follow from this perspective\u00a0are an almost natural reaction to a colony-like exploitation.<\/p>\n Marcus Garvey<\/p><\/div>\n For us, the important take away is the perception by activists and residents alike that the black ghetto can be colony-like–exploited by outsiders.\u00a0Being a colony\u00a0condemns the ghetto to a near-perpetual subordinate position–the persistence of the colony metaphor reinforces a separatist perspective. It also logically supports a natural desire to limit exploitation, by controlling neighborhood-level institutions themselves so one can limit control by outsiders. The Great Society community action program created an institution, the community development corporation,(CDC) whose purpose was to do just that–bring local institutions\/government field offices under local control. Harrison liked the CDC believing it to be the near-perfect instrument to implement a community development “comprehensive” approach across many policy areas simultaneously so that African-American ghetto residents could seize control of their neighborhood and declare independence from the mainstream capitalist economy and American society. \u00a0In the 1970’s, control of\u00a0neighborhood schools (even New York City turned control over to neighborhoods) was the institution that was targeted for neighborhood control. When combined with busing, neighborhood control of schools savagely disrupted most Big City politics.<\/p>\n In that atmosphere, community development bled into political development, and community organizing. This proved to be a volatile combination.<\/p>\n No where was this drive for neighborhood independence most visible and persistent than in controlling the police. Harrison in 1973 makes this observation: “While virtually all ghetto institutions are controlled by outsiders, none is more crucial to the colonial model than the police. Whether black or white (especially if the latter) the city-controlled police are often referred to by ghetto blacks as an ‘army of occupation’<\/em> [Eldridge Cleaver, 1969]. Current public investments in\u00a0‘crime control’ \u00a0[1970’s law and order initiatives such as Rizzo’s Philadelphia] are seen to only exacerbate the problem<\/em>” (Harrison, p. 5). Needless to say [but I’ll say it anyway], this line of thought may be relevant to current debate over 2015 Ferguson and Baltimore experiences.<\/p>\n Harrison’s final observation on the potential impact of ghetto as a colony lies in its reinforcing of the communalism or cooperation initiative called for by Du Bois. Not only does it link economic change with political control, the perspective encourages a “community” reaction to benefit the “community”. The push for individual achievement , certainly individual assimilation,\u00a0would seem to be greatly lessened with this approach. Conversely, the identification of the\u00a0individual ghetto resident with the overall community ,i.e. ghetto, is greatly strengthened. Neighborhood independence becomes Du Bois’s separatism.<\/p>\n I wonder if this, to some degree,\u00a0helps explain (in addition to discrimination and normal geographic neighborhood succession, of course) why post-1980 black suburbanization into racially concentrated suburbs\u00a0has not resulted in a general diffusion (assimilation) of blacks into mainstream suburbia–it may be that former black ghetto residents who suburbanize prefer to live in solidly black suburban neighborhoods–preserving the community in which they were raised and with which they identify. The link between the individual and the “community” may be too strong\u00a0 to break.<\/p>\n In this context, it is not hard to confuse “place” with “race”. Assimilation becomes impractical, if not irrelevant.<\/p>\n In any case, communalism, contrasted with individualism, seems relevant as the more preferred goal for a community development strategies in ghetto economic development. Individual achievement through entrepreneurship and participation in a capitalist economy seems out of place?<\/p>\n Individualism and Communalism<\/strong><\/p>\n In the writings\/advocacy of these two early intellectuals\/leaders, three important contrasts emerged. Du Bois rejected Washington’s assimilation-path, instead urging a separate, Negro-controlled, socialist, not capitalist\u00a0economy. Secondly, Washington stressed individual self-achievement, mastering skills and creating wealth\u00a0within the capitalist economy; entrepreneurism\u00a0or black small business formation was the principle strategy. Du Bois, however, argued for blacks to “cooperate”, to work together to develop separately from the colonial white economy. Thirdly, Du Bois stressed that cooperation should bring benefit to the black community as a whole, not to Washington’s\u00a0individual entrepreneurs. In effect, Du Bois rejected individual mobility [assimilation] in favor of a separate African-American community-wide prosperity achieved by cooperative action of its members. [Marcus Garvey also strongly advocated a black nationalist separatist path–even embracing\u00a0a “return to Africa” movement]<\/p>\n W.E.B. duBois<\/p><\/div>\n To Harrison, Du Bois’ “communalism’ meant “Service to family, clan, community, or nation becomes more than ‘the burden of being my brother’s keeper’. Serving [the community] is motivated not be some abstract code of behavior; rather one serves others to serve oneself<\/em>“. (p-4, citing Dixon\/Foster, 1971, p. 10). Communalism, Harrison asserts, dominated black thought during the 1970’s because it was a deeply embedded into the American black political culture.<\/p>\n There is also a feeling among some that collective approaches to black economic development are both natural and inevitable, given the tradition of African communalism which American blacks have inherited. Badi Foster writes\u00a0‘Contrary to the thrust of individualism, communalism holds that self-centeredness will not provide a just social order resulting from antagonistic cooperation<\/em> [supply vs demand, labor vs owner etc.]<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Further he asserts citing Hampden-Turner (1969, p.83):\u00a0“It has been suggested that blacks tend to reject the ‘ideology of economic individualism’ in the belief that whites in positions of economic and political power explicitly use that ideology ‘to dominate poor people and keep them competitively divided’<\/em>“. (p. 4). The icing on the communalism as political culture is that Du Bois himself , asserted that his “cooperation” “represents a revival of African communalism, a ‘tradition of cooperation in the field of economic endeavor<\/em> [which] is outstanding in Negro cultures everywhere<\/em>‘”. (Harrison p 2, Ofari, 1970, p. 12).<\/p>\n Since I clearly am not in the position to affirm or deny whether communalism is a dominant value in American black political culture. I am more open to the perspective that subsequent to the Great Migration, as blacks settled into a hostile economic, political and social competition with whites in the Big Cities of the industrial North and Midwest, many blacks living in depressed neighborhoods, with unresponsive urban governments evolved culturally from values that had sustained Washington. Leaving the South for northern climes, it might be argued, fostered a ghetto community achieved through a common culture and identity–separateness. In short, one does not have to embrace communalism as a core Black cultural value–it could have developed over time in response to a hostile outside world.<\/p>\n To return to Harrison’s argument, however, by the end of the 1960’s, separatism and communalism increasingly dominated black neighborhood (ghetto) consciousness. That is not to say, however, that Washington’s integrationist and individualism path had been rejected. Just the opposite, it too could be found in these neighborhoods at that time, but it was a minority position that got weaker over time to be sure. At that critical time, both coexisted. Our next section recounts how Harrison saw that coexistence playing out in competing economic development strategies.<\/p>\n Black Capitalism and Community Economic Development: Polar Opposites?<\/strong><\/p>\n Harrison defines “black capitalism” as “atomistic [i.e. individual-entrepreneur], business focused, and operating within conventional capitalist markets. He defines “community economic development” as “support of groups of producers or consumers acting collectively, with social benefit, and institutional change more important objectives of development than private profit [or individual success] [Harrison, p. 12].<\/p>\n Black capitalism<\/strong> works through conventional capitalist markets and black-owned companies. Harrison alleges that such firms are usually very small businesses, mostly in vulnerable personal services and retail sectors, and are store for store less profitable than non-black-owned businesses–even in the ghetto. Black capitalism seeks to change this situation and he suggests 1970’s Black Capitalism was pursuing the formation of larger Black-owned businesses that priced goods cheaper pricing with better quality through more efficient management. This strategy, adopted by most federal, state and local government programs was used to (1) address inequities associated with black entrepreneurism; (2) increase consumer welfare; and (3) provide greater political stability within the ghetto (Harrison, p. 14).<\/p>\n<\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a>