Race, Space, and Riots in Chicago, New York, and Los Angeles

Janeth. Abu-Lughod. Race, Space, and Riots in Chicago, New York, and Los Angeles. New York: Oxford UP, 2007. 344 pp. $35.00.

Race, Space, and Riots is, according to the author, a sequel to her ambitious study New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles: Americas Global Cities (1999), published by University of Minnesota Press. In her new book, urban sociologist Janet L. Abu-Lughod focuses more specifically on questions of race and racial violence in the same three cities. Her study asks why race relations in three of the largest U. S. metropolises have developed so differendy and seeks answers in the "historical, geographical/ spatial, and political characterisücs of the cities themselves (vil). She selects moments of mass public racial violence - commonly known as "race riots" - to investigate because these moments press at die seams of our "veneers of civility" and expose as illusions the discourses of progressive continuity, of communal and social harmony, and of national unity. By using the method of controlled comparison and focusing principally on six major race riots in the twentieth century, Abu-Lughod hopes to achieve three primary objectives: to highlight the changes in urban race relations over time due to migration, shifting labor demands, segregation in housing, and the civil rights movement; to explain the differences in riots by examining the cities' varying demographic compositions, the spatial distributions of minority groups within the cities, and the patterns and extent of racial segregation; and finally to demonstrate how the cities' local governments and police forces have reacted in ways that have either escalated or curbed the violence. Her larger goals are to deepen our understanding of racial and ethnic relations in contemporary urban environments and to offer suggestions to ameliorate current conditions for minorities who continue to suffer under exclusionary and oppressive political machines.

There are two chapters for each...