Category Archives: Sociology

Remembering Henry Ford’s failed suburban utopia in Brazil

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Read about Fordlandia, Henry Ford’s town built from scratch in Brazil:

The community was spurred by a problem caused by the incredible success of Ford’s empire. By the early 1900s, America was gobbling up more than 70 percent of the world’s rubber, most of it going to Detroit. These were the days when rubber still came from plants—meaning that most of it had to be shipped from Southeast Asia. Ford, a dude who was pretty into efficiency, was hesitant to keep buying his company’s supply from Asia, where British rubber plantations were churning out most of the global supply. So he set out to establish his own rubber farm. In a fit of creativity, he named it Fordlandia.

In 1928, Ford sent an envoy of supplies and Ford workers to a 6,000-square-mile plot of land on the Amazon. The charter’s mission was to embed American suburbia in the heart of the rainforest. Within a relatively short period of time, they’d set up homes, running water, electricity—plus all kinds of other extras (like swimming pools) that played to Ford’s belief that leisure was an essential part of the economy.

Local workers were expected to adopt a suburban Michigan lifestyle, too—along with a healthy dose of Ford’s own morals, which meant that both booze and ladies were outlawed within the town. According to a terrific podcast from How Things Work, the transplant town even hosted mandatory square dancing. Hamburgers and other American fare featured in the cafeteria…

But it turned out that rubber plants were being cultivated in Southeast Asia instead for a very good reason: There were no natural floral predators there, as there were in Brazil. Production was sluggish, and the Michigan managers had zero botany know-how.

Three things are notable: Ford’s attempt to control production from start to finish, his interest in having a company town, and his idea that he could simply import an American suburb to Brazil. This could be interpreted as a quixotic effort but it also seems to have darker undertones of American imperialism.

Unrealized city plans for major cities

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Wired has a set of interesting maps of city plans that were never carried out including a 1948 highway plan for San Francisco, plans for expanding Boston’s subway in 1945, and a 1925 rapid transit plan for Los Angeles.

But there are also maps that describe the world as it never came to be.

Those are the maps that interest Andrew Lynch, who runs a Tumblr called Hyperreal Cartography & The Unrealized City that’s full of city maps collected from libraries, municipal archives, and dark corners of the internet…

Many of the works featured on Lynch’s Tumblr date to idyllic post-war America. I asked him if these represent dreams of a perfect future. “Old plans are always so optimistic,” he said. “There are these beautiful, sometimes utopian visions of what these cities could be.” Of course, while a car for every home and a highway through every neighborhood seemed charming at the time, such an idea would make a modern urban planner shudder. One era’s Utopia is another’s hell.

Lynch embraces these contradictions. The maps featured on his blog are not reality, but they are not entirely fictional. They serve as a reminder that every city is built on the past while keeping an eye on the future. Somewhere underneath these maps is the skeleton of a recognizable place, but the flesh on the bones is both foreign and oddly familiar.

How could they not feature Burnham’s famous 1909 plan for Chicago? The plan still gets a lot of attention even if his biggest ideas were not carried out. Perhaps it is too well-known for this small sampling. Check out the full collection here.

While these maps are featured as interesting “what-ifs” or alternative futures, I suspect most cities have such plans floating around. Wouldn’t we prefer that big cities are thinking about all sorts of possibilities?

Why the UN is in New York CIty, not suburban Connecticut, San Francisco, Philadelphia, or the Black Hills

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I recently read Capital of the World: The Race to Host the United Nations by Charlene Mires. The story of how the United Nations ended up on the East River in New York City in the late 1940s is a pretty interesting tale and I will summarize who was in the running.

1. The Black Hills. From the beginning of the UN process involving multiple conferences and committees, the Black Hills tried to attract the United Nations. This was primarily through the efforts of one persistent booster. The argument was that the location represented a new frontier near the geographic center of the United States with plenty of room for a headquarters.

2. San Francisco. The city successfully hosted the 1945 UN San Francisco Conference and represented a world shift toward the Pacific. In the end, the city was eliminated from the running rather early on because delegates from Europe refused to travel that far.

3. Suburban Connecticut. After focusing on the American East Coast, suburban New York, particularly in Westchester County or near Greenwich, Connecticut was the primary option. UN members did not want to be located in New York City, partly because of a lack of connection with nature and partly because of an interest in building a whole new United Nations city. At one point, the UN had plans developed for several plots of land that would involve tens of square miles for this new city. However, NIMBY concerns from suburban residents put these plans to rest: suburbanites were worried the international organization would disturb their idyllic communities.

4. With the New York suburbs essentially taking themselves out of the running, Philadelphia emerged as a viable option. The city made their pitch as the birthplace of modern liberty. The UN was concerned about corruption in the city. As they wondered if Philadelphia would be possible…

5. New York emerged as the winner after the Rockefeller family put together a deal for land to be offered to the UN on the East River (the current site). While New York wouldn’t allow a large city within a city development, there was enough land for a large building and delegates could take advantage of Manhattan’s amenities. As the UN was deciding on its permanent home, they had been temporarily located on Long Island but the facilities were located near eyesores and the commute was too much for many participants.

To me, the most interesting part of the story was the competition and fervor of boosters from around the United States. Dozens of communities lobbied the United Nations – though some had many more resources than others and only few had realistic chances from the beginning. They envisioned the United Nations providing status as well as economic opportunities.

If New York City suburbanites hadn’t lobbied against the headquarters, we might today know a UN city located 20-50 miles outside of Manhattan. But, of course, it seems natural today that the UN is located in the #1 global city.

New report says Australians to move away from McMansions, seek out smaller homes

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A new report suggests Australian builders will shift away from McMansions in the next decade:

Australia’s leading builders and developers predict that an appetite for small homes will be the dominant theme throughout the coming decade, according to a new report.

Three other major trends to impact the residential housing sector in the next 10 years will be affordability, diversity and walkability.

“What leading industry players told us in our interviews is that we are seeing a maxing out of the average house size,” says Deon White, managing director of urban design and town planning firm RobertsDay, publisher of the new report.

“The trend of the McMansion is on the decline; Australians are turning away from the super-large Australian home. Instead, they’re starting to engage with the concept of the smaller home. People want to live a little more; they want less of their income drained into their weekly mortgage payments.”

This mirrors ideas in the United States where critics of McMansions and other large homes suggest the focus should move away from space and most bang for your buck to customization and community life. New Urbanists, for example, would likely approve of all of these forecasted trends. At the same time, planning for a diverse range of affordable smaller homes within walkable neighborhoods is not necessarily cheap and it requires a large change of focus than simply building different kinds of homes. To make this all happen on a scale beyond just a few new developments requires the combined efforts of builders, people in charge of zoning and regulation, mortgage providers and financiers, and buyers.

Richmond, CA wants to address foreclosures with eminent domain

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Richmond, California is seriously considering a more radical municipal approach to foreclosures:

The city has offered to buy more than 600 underwater mortgages at below the homes’ current value.

“If they are unwilling to negotiate a sale of the loans, which we want them to do, then we will consider using eminent domain as another option to purchase these loans at fair market value,” said Richmond Mayor Gayle McLaughlin…

Richmond is the first city in the country to take the controversial step of threatening to use eminent domain, the power to take private property for public use. But other cities have also explored the idea…

Banks, the real estate industry and Wall Street are vehemently opposed to the idea, calling it “unconstitutional” and a violation or property rights, and something that will likely cause a flurry of lawsuits.

It will be interesting to see how this plays out. I suspect a number of communities would argue they have few other options in order to force the hands of mortgage providers.

Problems in Detroit include “dysfunctional American sociology” and lack of regional governance

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One commentator focuses on the lack of metropolitan governance in Detroit and also mentions “dysfunctional American sociology.” Here is the bit on sociology:

And without widespread racism, there would have been fewer ghettoized African-Americans.

Hard to ignore this. See the work of scholar Thomas Sugrue in The Origins of the Urban Crisis: Race and Inequality in Postwar Detroit.

Here is more of the argument for regional governance:

In a European-style metro Detroit, unified regional planning would favor reconstruction of the old city centre over new buildings and new highways in ever more distant locations. Some of the tax revenue raised in what are today separate affluent suburban jurisdictions would be spent in the centre of the city. With better roads, schools, police and services, Detroit’s slums would be less slummy and the culture of crime and despair would probably be less entrenched.

There’s actually no need to go to Europe to find better ways to arrange urban jurisdictions. As David Rusk points out in his book “Cities without Suburbs”, the American cities that have expanded their city limits along with their populations generally have stronger economies, less racial segregation and more equal income distribution than the mostly older cities with rigid borders.

The ethical issue can be reduced to an old question: who is my neighbor? Everyone, even economists who believe people should be selfish, recognizes that it is helpful to work together as a community. Almost everyone, perhaps excluding a few cold-hearted economists, would agree that the strong in a community have some obligation to help the weak. But how large is the relevant community?…

David Rusk, Myron Orfield, and others have made the argument for regional governance for decades but it has had difficult gaining traction, particularly in wealthier suburbs that do not see this as such a clear-cut ethical issue. Opposition to regional governance is rooted in longer issues between cities and less urban areas where cities are viewed as bad places full of crime, race, immigrants, densities that are too high, uncleanliness, and other “urban problems.” Why should people who made the choice to move to suburbs be held responsible for the problems of people in other communities? Ultimately, perhaps this is rooted in American individualism which views all moves to the suburbs as the result of individual merit and also tends to lead to an interest in government or control that is as local as possible.

Sociologist Charles Tilly honored in Elmhurst, IL

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It is not often that you see renowned sociologists acknowledged by their high schools in the Chicago suburbs: the late Charles Tilly is being honored by York High School in Elmhurst.

York High School finally has its first group of hall of famers—or as they are referred to in District 205, Dukes of Distinction.

This well-deserved group was culled from nominations submitted by Elmhurst community members, District 205 staff, alumni and others early this year. These eight honorees have distinguished themselves through significant and extraordinary accomplishments, service and an outstanding contribution to society…

Dr. Charles Tilly, Class of 1946

Dr. Tilly was a a comparative and historical sociologist, analyst of social movements, and a social theorist, political sociologist and methodological innovator. Dr. Tilly authored 51 books and over 600 articles, as well as directing over 200 doctoral dissertations. He was a member of numerous scientific academies and a lecturer at universities all over the world. He was called “an intellectual global powerhouse,” whose contributions led to the development of seven subfields in sociology. Dr. Tilly died in 2008.

Perhaps I’m alone in this but I would be intrigued to hear how well-known sociologists made it from high school to an academic career in sociology. Is there anything about Lombard and Elmhurst that pushed Tilly toward sociology? I recently saw another suggestion that the lives of adults tend to mirror their lives in high school, which is highly reductionistic and depressing, but perhaps future sociologists were different?

Also, given the history of sociology in Chicago, how many other sociologists are from the Chicago suburbs? How about a per capita look at which major US regions produce the most sociologists?

Projection: US homeownership rate to continue to fall

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One firm projects the homeownership rate in the United States will continue to fall through next year:

The homeownership rate in the second quarter was unchanged from the prior three month period, according to Census Bureau data released today. It will hit bottom at about 64 percent in the next year as families leave the foreclosure pipeline and enter rental homes, according to a May analysis by London-based Capital Economics Inc. It’s currently the lowest in almost 18 years after averaging about 64 percent for 30 years through 1995.

First-time buyers and minorities are among the groups that have seen the sharpest declines since the crash. While property ownership among senior citizens was little changed at about 81 percent, the share below age 35 that own a home fell to about 37 percent from almost 42 percent five years earlier.

The rate for blacks reached almost 50 percent in the second quarter of 2004 from about 43 percent in 1995, Census Bureau data show. By the second quarter of this year, it had dropped to 42.9 percent. The rate for whites fell to 73.3 percent in the second quarter, from 76.2 percent in 2004.

The good news: the projection suggests the bottom is about 64 percent. The bad news: there are still plenty of people caught in the foreclosure pipeline. This is a reminder that foreclosures aren’t just about people having to leave their current home; it also gunks up the market far down the road.

See charts of the trends, with the latest 2013 2Q data, here.

Urban quiz: identify the city solely by its Starbucks locations

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See the Starbucks locations and identify the major city.

The quiz suggests you can see the rough outline of the city but this isn’t quite the case. It is probably more accurate to say that you can name the city from the higher-income neighborhoods where Starbucks are located (or not seeing the lower-income neighborhoods on the map). For example, look at the map of Chicago and the relative lack of locations on the west and south sides:

StarbucksinChicago

In other words, Starbucks acts as a proxy for other important factors in cities.

“Sociological experiment” with children using mobile devices

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An Australian psychologist suggests we don’t quite know what will happen with lots of young children now using tablets and other electronics:

Research indicates that almost half of all toddlers up to two years old have played with a mobile device. It also reveals that 15 per cent of that group can also operate a home entertainment system. That rises to 31 per cent of three- to five-year-olds and a third of six- to eight-year-olds.

The study of 750 adults across Australia who have an internet connection included questions about how children interact with technology and was conducted by media intelligence firm Magna Global.

Most frequently used were iPads (27 per cent for three- to five-year-olds and 43 per cent for six- to eight-year-olds) followed by Wi-Fi-enabled laptops (21 per cent for three- to five-year-olds and 38 per cent for six- to eight-years-olds)…

Jordy Kaufman, a child psychologist and founder of the Swinburne BabyLab, has studied how children interact with devices. ”Given the massive uptake of mobile device use by young kids, we can be said to be engaged in a grand sociological experiment where no one knows what the results will be,” he said.

But he cautions that just because we do not know the outcome, that does not mean the use of devices is negative. There are opportunities for learning from iPads that did not exist before, Dr Kaufman said.

I suppose there are three possible reactions to the situation. Go all in and see the use of mobile electronics as simply part of the progress of the modern world. Americans tend to like progress and new opportunities and these devices certainly fulfill these two requirements. This full usage may occur even with evidence that they don’t contribute much to learning. The opposite reaction is to not allow children access to such devices. To some degree, this is helped by the fact that such devices are not yet completely ubiquitous. But, some may want to wait and see how children respond to mobile devices. And, there is some middle ground where children could use new electronics in moderation alongside more “traditional” activities.

It sounds like we need some sort of randomized experiment to help figure this out. But, we are getting close to a time where it would be really difficult to pull this off.