I just read, in The Weekly Standard, an interesting review of two new-ish books on the "decline of cities" and urban policy. (I'm very interested in this topic, about which my wife, Nicole Stelle Garnett, and our co-blogger Vince Rougeau write and teach).
As described by the reviewer, Harry Siegel, Douglas Rae's City: Urbanism and Its End, analyzes the process and causes of New Haven's fall "from a working-class manufacturing center to a cluster of dilapidated housing projects." This fall -- which, believe me, is real -- took place notwithstanding the fact that New Haven was the "flagship city of the Great Society's 'Model Cities' program" and "received far more federal dollars per capital than any other city."
E. Michael Jones's book, "The Slaughter of the Cities: Urban Renewal as Ethnic Cleansing," offers, Siegel reports, a "paranoid and disturbing perspective": Jones's argument is that "a WASP elite that ran the federal government used southern blacks as its unwitting pawns in a vast 'psychological warfare campaign' against unassimilated white ethnics, particularly urban Catholics and their parishes." Siegel makes it clear that Jones's arguments are uncautious, and often offensive -- particularly in his apparent insistence that urban Catholics who resisted integration were blameless victims, and not racists. With that caveat, though, Siegel suggests that "Jones is onto something significant": "The destruction of the working class," he says, "homeowning urban neighborhoods was not . . . just the necessary outcome of economic and demographic changes but also the result of ill-considered government policies written by urban planners often contemptuous of Catholics and patronizing towards blacks."
I have not read the books, and so cannot endorse them. Still, it strikes me that their subject -- and the ideas raised in Siegel's review -- are relevant to "Mirror of Justice" readers for at least two reasons: First, I kept thinking, as I read the review, about several exchanges we've had, over the past few weeks, about "subsidiarity," and what it really means. Next, and more generally, I'd love to hear others' thoughts about what CST has to say about "urbanism" -- not only about criminal justice, welfare policy, housing policy, etc., all of which affects life in our cities, but about "urbanism" more generally. Do Catholic claims about the person have any implications for how we *ought* to structure our cities and communities?
Rick
UPDATE: I received an e-mail from Tom Messner, a student of mine (who also contributes to the Christus Victor blog), commenting on this post. He writes:
I think Jones’ reflection on the disasters of urban/social planning . . . suggests we should . . . rephrase (your) question to read: "What we ought NOT to do in structuring our cities and communities, in light of Catholic Social Teaching?" I don’t know that much about subsidiarity, so I’ll use this definition: “As a person with an eternal destiny, man cannot find his fulfillment in the state or in any temporal order. From this arises the principle of subsidiarity, which denies the claim of the state to total competence.” (C. Rice). If ever the state has proved itself totally INCOMPETENT, surely it has done so in its “structuring of cities and communities” in certain neighborhoods in Detroit, Philadelphia, Chicago, and Boston (the four cities on which Jones focuses). So I think maybe one of the most basic things subsidiarity might "mean” with respect to urban planning is a very MINIMAL role for the state: it’s got a bad track record. This may be too obvious and simplistic; but maybe it’s not, at least not as some sort of baseline.
Tom also observes that "the purpose of civil society and of human law is to promote the common good, which is ‘the sum total of social conditions which allow people, either as groups or as individuals, to reach their fulfillment more fully and more easily.’" He then goes on to offer some thoughts about what this statement means in the context of urban development and policy.
I've encouraged Tom to post his thoughts over at Christus Victor.
ANOTHER UPDATE: Another Notre Dame law student (and blogger) has noted her disagreement with Tom's take (supra) on CST and urban planning. Check out "View From the Dome," here. It sounds like VFTD would apply CST principles to the story described by Rae and Jones in a very different way. I'd love to hear more.
One quick observation: VFTD mentions her views on the "prudence of deregulation of housing." I take it that Rae and Jones are not discussing so much the question whether habitability rules, rent control, etc., actually help or hurt low-income persons and families, but broader issues of "urbanism," city planning, zoning, etc. That is -- and perhaps VFTD agrees -- one could believe (as I, tentatively, do) that many so-called urban-renewal policies have been disastrous in their aesthetic, social, economic, and moral effects, while *still* opposing the "deregulation of housing," or without also believing that, say, many features of landlord-tenant and housing-code law lead to the (unintended) consequence of shrinking the pool of housing available to poor people.
Rick
RG
I log onto our blog, and have a few thoughts and some reactions - why can’t I bring myself to really jump in and post? At first I thought it was because up until recently I have been too busy to take the time to sufficiently think out my reactions. But now it’s Spring Break, and I do have some time. Perhaps I am overly cautious… Usually before I publish something I ask at least five or six friends to read it over and react, and then I usually make a heap of changes. The thought of “publishing” onto the anonymous world-wide-web what still feel like random thoughts goes against my cautious grain.
But then, musing a bit more, I realized my hesitation was even deeper than that. Perhaps the specific person to whom my thoughts may be addressed won’t have time for a while to listen - someone else may jump in, and the person to whom my thoughts were originally addressed may get lost in the shuffle. Or maybe my response is based on a misunderstanding of what the other person was trying to say - and the blog feels like an awkward and somewhat too public forum to work towards understanding one another.
And who know how else my approach to the conversation is shaped by the thought that other nameless folks may read our exchange? Then I realized what was bothering me was that it all had a sort of “reality-TV” feel - am I really talking to a specific person, or to an anonymous mass? If an anonymous mass is present, can we really have a conversation without being too self-conscious?
I’m sure I am over-thinking this… but perhaps it is a more feminine reaction to the medium. Before I talk to someone, I want to make sure they are ready to listen, and if not, I’d rather wait. (for this reason, I like personal email - it can wait). I want a personal connection - a chance to apologize if perhaps I wasn’t listening well enough, and ask more questions, get further clarification on your thoughts - all dimensions which seem to require a not-too-public forum. Then, when I publish something for a broader community, I hope what I write reflects an effort to think carefully about the audience and the anticipated questions, the need for further explanations and backgrounds, etc. - a process which strikes me as a very different forum than a personal exchange. So I’m having a lot of trouble with the way the blog medium merges the two.
Please don’t take this as a criticism - I think the blog is a wonderful idea as a way to keep each other informed about scholarship and events - and genuinely do want to understand how this kind of technology can further the conversation and exchange. But I just haven’t yet been able to put together how to use this kind of technology and still maintain a hoped for personal dimension and personal connection.
If anyone can help me with this (or has similar thoughts) I am all ears.
Thanks for listening, Amy
Here's an insightful response from Gerald J. Russello to my query as to whether there's a double standard if we insist that Gonzaga recognize the Christian Legal Society chapter, but don't insist that Seton Hall recognize the gay student group:
The difference between Gonzaga and Seton Hall, to my mind, is that between "old fashioned" liberalism and something new. Seton Hall presents the traditional academic freedom dilemma: should a Catholic institution allow students to advocate on an issue in a school-approved group that is not compatible with its self-understanding as a Catholic institution. I believe Seton Hall is right not to permit such groups, because from a Catholic perspective that issue has been discussed and a conclusion reached. The issue can be discussed in a classroom, but not treated as an "expression" equivalent with other approved student groups. (We had similar debates when I was a student at Georgetown over pro-choice student groups).
With Harvard and InterVarsity, the issue is different. The "expansive view of non-discrimination" you rightly identify as the motivating force here conditions the identity of the participants in the debate. The particular issue is, in some sense, irrelevant. In other words, the discrimination against InterVarsity is not because of the point of view (advocating Christian legal principles in law), but because of the internal structure of the group itself (restricting leadership to Christians). Harvard may publicly proclaim that it has no "bias" against Christianity, but it believes all groups should reflect the student body, i.e., Christian groups should be subject internally to non-discrimination as a condition to recognition, even if the self-understanding of the group does not permit such non-discrimination. The secular ideology controls the way groups can understand themselves, even if (as in the case with a secular university) it disclaims any interest in the outcome of the debate. If this analysis is right, I think we can develop a principled distinction between the way we approach these two forms of pluralism.
As to your point on liberalism-as-religion, I disagree, not because it is not true, but primarily because liberals do not see it that way. From the perspective of liberalism, there is no "religious level" truth except tolerance, which cannot press its own truth claims. Crediting liberalism with the conviction of religion imports our own religious values to a system that, while deeply held, cannot come to conclusive answers to ultimate questions.
Gerald J. Russello
