Fighting Poverty with Mobility: A Normative Policy Analysis¹

Abstract

Concentrated urban poverty is America's deepest social problem. Eliminating it stands as our nation's greatest challenge. In this article I analyze from a normative perspective antipoverty policies that attempt to address this problem via "mobility," that is, policies that attempt to disperse the urban poor to suburban locations. I find these policies to be normatively problematic on two grounds: the level coercion experienced by (and the corresponding lack of free choice given) a vulnerable population and the undesirable effects (in the current context of American urban development) caused by failing to regard established neighborhoods as stable communities. The results of this analysis indicate strongly the need to generate increased levels of economic activity in America's inner cities, and I suggest that more research on this issue be conducted with an eye toward formulating and implementing a comprehensive strategy to bring about inner-city revitalization.

“[U]Nited and Actuated by Some Common Impulse of Passion”: Challenging the Dispersal Consensus in American Housing Policy Research

“…Yet, when considering how the exercise of choice might be made more “real,” all of the policies she advocates involve expanding exit options, such as expanding “the number and scale of assisted housing mobility initiatives” (i.e., Gautreaux/MTO‐type measures) and removing “regulatory and administrative barriers that now make it difficult for families to move between jurisdictions” (Turner, 1998: 388; also see Katz & Turner, 2001). In short, the zeal to push dispersal seems to blind Turner (1998) to the reality that exercising, in her words, “real choice about where to live” also includes enhancing the choice to live in one's current neighborhood by making such neighborhoods more livable (see Imbroscio, 2004b).…”

“…Including this context transforms our understanding of the behavior of assisted mobility participants from an exercise of choice to a reaction to coercion 17 . Preferences for dispersal become nothing more than a desperate response to a set of desperate conditions, with little to do with any real notion of freedom of choice (Imbroscio, 2004b). 18 Correcting for this distortion, Frug (1999: 173) offers a more complete conception of the urban poor's “freedom of choice.” This conception, he writes, “supplements the freedom [of choice] to move with the freedom [of choice] to stay put—a freedom possible only if fear of violence and concern about bad schools no longer compel people to move, if they can, whether they want to or not ” (emphasis added).…”

“…17 17 The work of the political theorist Don Herzog (1989) critiquing consent theory elucidates what is at issue here (see Imbroscio, 2004b). In this critique, Herzog posits “the principle of alternatives,” which states, “to say some action was voluntary requires that there were alternatives … [a principle] built into the syntax of consent and voluntary action” (Herzog, 1989: 225).…”

From vice to nice : A case study of Newport, Kentucky's HOPE VI program.

“…Their decisions become nothing more than "a desperate response to a desperate set of conditions with little to do with any real notion of freedom of choice" (Imbroscio, 2004;Imbroscio, 2008, 115). Galster and Mikelsons (1995) Galster (1996), and Reid (2007 extrapolate the geography of opportunity hypothesis and the linkages between geography and opportunity into the metropolitan opportunity structure, which is the set of institutions, markets, social and administrative systems and networks, and the individual's perception of the structures available to them, influenced by geography, that impacts an individual's socioeconomic mobility.…”

Trapped in the Tiebout model : the impact of federal affordable housing programs on migration of wealthier residents.

“…First, the theory of spatial mismatch and empirical finding indicated that poverty was positively related to the lack of physical accessibility to economic opportunities (Holzer, 1991). Since housing mobility programs could bridge the gap between low-skilled workers and low-skilled jobs in suburbs, housing mobility programs were considered the best solution to fight poverty by many urban scholars (Imbroscio, 2004b(Imbroscio, , 2006.…”