Sprawl, Justice, and Citizenship: The Civic Costs of the American Way of Life
Thad Williamson
Abstract
Must the strip mall and the eight-lane highway define 21st century American life? That is a central question posed by critics of suburban and exurban living in America. Yet despite the ubiquity of the critique, it never sticks—Americans by the scores of millions have willingly moved into sprawling developments over the past few decades. Americans find many of the more substantial criticisms of sprawl easy to ignore because they often come across as snobbish in tone. Yet as this book explains, sprawl does create real, measurable social problems. This book is unique in two important ways. First, ... More
Must the strip mall and the eight-lane highway define 21st century American life? That is a central question posed by critics of suburban and exurban living in America. Yet despite the ubiquity of the critique, it never sticks—Americans by the scores of millions have willingly moved into sprawling developments over the past few decades. Americans find many of the more substantial criticisms of sprawl easy to ignore because they often come across as snobbish in tone. Yet as this book explains, sprawl does create real, measurable social problems. This book is unique in two important ways. First, while it highlights the deleterious effects of sprawl on civic life in America, it is also evenhanded. The book does not dismiss the pastoral, homeowning ideal that is at the root of sprawl, and is sympathetic to the vast numbers of Americans who very clearly prefer it. Secondly, the book's critique is neither aesthetic nor moralistic in tone, but based on social science. Utilizing a landmark 30,000-person survey, the book shows that sprawl fosters civic disengagement, accentuates inequality, and negatively impacts the environment.
Keywords:
suburban living,
exurban living,
America,
sprawl,
social problems,
civic disengagement,
inequality,
environment
Bibliographic Information
| Print publication date: 2010 |
Print ISBN-13: 9780195369434 |
| Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: October 2011 |
DOI:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195369434.001.0001 |
