Us versus Them: Race, Crime, and Gentrification in Chicago Neighborhoods
Oxford University Press, 2020.
Us versus Them describes struggles over the politics of crime and gentrification in two racially-diverse Chicago neighborhoods, Rogers Park and Uptown. It draws on three and a half years of participant observation, 78 in-depth interviews, and additional historical research. The book traces in detail the racially contested interplay between anti-crime initiatives, gentrification, and social justice activism. It shows how safety activists pushed the city and their political representatives to intensify policing, leading to additional arrests, evictions, and the complete transformation of entire buildings. However, the book also shows how some residents resisted these efforts, seeking to protect affordable housing and equal access to public space. These battles pitted neighbors, community organizations, and political leaders against one another as they pursued their local agendas. At the heart of these maneuvers, the book uncovers a ceaseless battle over racial meanings that unfolded as residents strove to make local initiatives and urban change appear racially benign or malignant. The book provides novel insights into the strategic use of race as a political category as well as the mechanisms linking crime, policing, and gentrification. Read the reviews: American Journal of Sociology Journal of Urban Affairs Times Literary Supplement |
Back cover blurbs:
"Building on both new and enduring questions about place and culture, Us versus Them explores how neighborhood context shapes residents' approaches to racialized policing and community safety initiatives. Relying on detailed ethnographic evidence and engaging with timely questions related to gentrification, concentrated poverty, and micro-segregation, the author provides a vivid portrait of residents' racialized boundary-making projects in two Chicago neighborhoods. Doering's detailed attention to the work of small groups in neighborhood safety initiatives provides a rich account that generates an important set of questions for students and scholars of policing, neighborhood effects, and diversity and integration to pursue." -- Japonica Brown-Saracino, Boston University
"In Us vs Them, Jan Doering takes the reader inside street-level contestation over race, crime, and gentrification in Chicago neighborhoods. Built on rich ethnographic and interview data, the end result is a deeply researched book that provides theoretical and empirical insight into how local politics shape the way residents talk about and understand neighborhood crime. Doering convincingly shows that the racial meanings attached to crime are partly a function of the political environment in which that meaning-making occurs. This engrossing read makes an original contribution to scholarship on race and politics and should be read by anyone interested in the politics of gentrification." -- Corey D. Fields, Georgetown University
"This important book puts some of the most divisive issues of our day - crime, gentrification, political polarization, and racial identity - under the microscope. It unpacks divisions within already racially integrated Chicago neighborhoods over strategies to address significant crime problems. Ensuing chapters document how well-meaning prevention efforts splintered communities and racial tensions spilled over into electoral politics, creating a minefield for politicians trying to build majority coalitions. Some succeeded, and the study illuminates how good leadership can lower the temperature around debates involving race and class, and find paths toward community solidarity around common problems." -- Wesley Skogan, Northwestern University