Right to the Suburb? Rethinking Lefebvre and Immigrant Activism

Abstract

In the face of increasing migration by Latinos to suburbs and multi-scalar policies criminalizing immigrants, municipalities are increasingly confronting the question, Who has the Right to the Suburb? We seek to better understand how the tensions between suburbanites and Latino immigrants are addressed by municipal governments as immigration enforcement is increasingly rescaled to the local level. Case studies of Maywood and Costa Mesa in Southern California suggest responses are by no means similar and can actually be contrasting, given the city's historical trajectories, socio-economic status, political leadership, and networks of activists. Suburban struggles are often assumed to be conservative and as a result are undertheorized as sites of liberatory struggle. While the urban realm remains the most visible stage of social movements, this paper suggests immigrant activism is increasingly being generated in suburbs, election-based organizing can be an effective gateway to municipal level change, and seeking to expand or constrict the Right to the City necessarily entails multi-scalar efforts.

Intersectionality and planning at the margins: LGBTQ youth of color in New York

“…The study particularly expands the ethical call for planners to contribute to progressive struggles for greater rights to the city and socio-spatial justice for minoritized groups (Carpio, Irazábal, and Pulido 2011;Irazábal and Dyrness 2010;Irazábal and Farhat 2008;Kotin, Dyrness, and Irazábal 2011). We expose how FIERCE and their allies have resisted displacement and defended access to certain spaces, amenities, and services with relative success.…”

Deserving Welcome? Immigrants, Christian Faith Communities, and the Contentious Politics of Belonging in the US South

“…In exploring these ambiguities, our account of faith communities’ engagements with immigrants stands in contrast to some recent scholarship that has emphasized the role of churches in social‐justice advocacy on behalf of immigrants (e.g. Carpio et al ; Hondagneu‐Sotelo ; Irazábal and Dyrness ; Kotin et al ). Clearly, Christian faith communities have had an important role in challenging exclusionary immigration policies and in imagining and forging a more inclusive polity (Cloke and Beaumont ).…”

Learning alliance methodology: Contributions and challenges for multicultural planning in health service provision: A case study in Kent, UK

“…This approach may hide the complex, multiple, overlapping, conflicting, asymmetrical, and fluctuating power relations among group members (Irazábal & Huerta, 2014;Irazábal & Punja, 2009). Moreover, Sandoval (2013) highlights how, in the USA, multicultural planning may inversely affect undocumented immigrant communities in which the private sector and local government officials turn a blind eye to new migrants' legal status in favour of the benefits of a cheap, endless labour pool for employers, rental income for landlords, and property and sales taxes for local government within the area surrounding the places of work where the employees and their affiliates settle (Carpio, Irazábal, & Pulido, 2011;Yiftachel, 1998).…”