Description

The history of land use and urban development in the United States has significantly contributed to racial and economic inequality through municipal disinvestment, urban renewal, segregation, and predatory lending practices. Consequently, low-income, communities of color have been disproportionately impacted by, among other things, the foreclosure crisis, gentrification, and homelessness. Housing policy and neighborhood revitalization programs proposed to remedy these impacts have been often demonstrated ineffective due to their colorblind and top-down character (e.g., mandatory inclusionary housing, section 8, housing preference etc.). These inequities are heightened by the realities of climate change, austerity, and the uncertain futures of post-Covid-19 urbanism. This session contemplates collective and community-based approaches to more racially conscious and equitable futures through collective ownership of land and housing, climate-induced retreat, and neighborhood change. Pulling at the threads of a national fabric tightly woven together on the loom of racial capitalism, we collectively put forth new imaginaries by wrestling with an ever-present past. By highlighting the tensions amidst the possibilities for more equitable futures, we place the limits of technocratic approaches to race in planning - in its variety of forms - at the center of our analyses to foster more sober assessments and conversations about the meaning and practices of racial equity and equality.