平特五不中
Jan Doering. Us versus Them: Race, Crime, and Gentrification in Chicago Neighborhoods, New York, Oxford University Press, 2020.
Commented by Jan Doering, associate member (March 2021):
Aside from the being the year during which COVID-19 became a worldwide pandemic, 2020 may also be remembered in North America as a year of unprecedented protest against institutional racism, especially (although not exclusively) within police departments. Proposals for fundamental police reform and defunding police departments are now widely debated in Canada, the United States, and elsewhere. But one aspect that is sometimes absent from these debates is that racism does not only shape the police from within鈥攊t also enters into policing in response to the potentially biased demands of citizens, who call 911 disproportionally to report black people, push for increased patrols, and demand cracking down on low-income housing within their neighbourhoods.
On the basis of over three years of participant observation, Us versus Them examines local conflicts in two racially-diverse Chicago neighborhoods over issues of race, crime, policing, as well as the related issue of gentrification. The book shows how some residents strategically use their access to the police to advance gentrification at the cost of racial harassment, while others seek to fight criminalization and the displacement of people of colour from their neighborhoods. Conflicts between these groups are tense and bitter鈥攖hey frequently pit neighbours, community groups, and local leaders against one another. The book systematically disentangles these conflicts and examines how they ultimately shape neighbourhood change.
[Watch the video recording of the seminar based on this book.]
