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“Separate, Therefore Equal”: American Spatial Segregation from Jim Crow to Kiryas Joel

February 2021
RSF The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences 7(1):67-90

DOI:10.7758/RSF.2021.7.1.05

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Bar Ilan University

In rejecting Plessy v. Ferguson’s “separate but equal” doctrine in Brown v. Board of Education, the U.S. Supreme Court created a presumption that segregation equals discrimination. However, alongside this assertion, American space has become increasingly separate. A socio-legal analysis identifies three generations of spatial segregation in the United States and calls for recognizing the fourth generation—separate, therefore equal—in which minority communities require voluntary self-segregation to achieve equality. This fourth generation of spatial separation requires the law to embrace a protective role, by which it will defend the ability of minority communities to segregate spatially, the autonomy of individual community members, and the welfare of the society at large.

Three Generations of American Spatial Segregation

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Shai Stern is professor of law at Bar Ilan University, Israel.

from Jim Crow to Kiryas Joel.” RSF: The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences 7(1): 67–90. DOI:

10.7758/RSF.2021.7.1.05. I am grateful for the substantial feedback I have received from numerous colleagues,

including Omri Ben Zvi, Lee Cahaner, Hanoch Dagan, Tsilly Dagan, Shahar Lifshitz, Avital Margalit, Miriam

Marcowitz- Bitton, Manal Totry- Jubran, Masua Sagiv, Samuel C. Heilman, and the participants of the colloquium

of public law at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. All opinions expressed in this article represent those of the

author and all errors in this paper are solely the responsibility of the author. Direct correspondence to: Shai Stern

at shai.stern@biu.ac.il, Bar Ilan University, Ramat Gan, 5290002, Israel.

Open Access Policy: RSF: The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences is an open access journal.

This article is published under a Creative Commons Attribution- NonCommercial- NoDerivs 3.0 Unported Li-

cense.

lic services, no one does not take up space.

Thus, although segregation in some areas may

aﬀect sections of the population, spatial segre-

gation aﬀects the entire population. Second,

given the physical characteristics of space, spa-

tial segregation can be more clearly identiﬁed,

diagnosed, and measured than in other spheres

(Massey and Denton ). Third, control of

space and its distribution is a prime source for

the development of segregation and discrimi-

nation on other levels (Massey ; powell

; Acevedo- Garcia and Lochner ; Klar-

“Separate, Therefore Equal”:

American Spatial Segregation

from Jim Crow to Kiryas Joel

 

In rejecting Plessy v. Ferguson’s “separate but equal” doctrine in Brown v. Board of Education, the U.S.

Supreme Court created a presumption that segregation equals discrimination. However, alongside this as-

sertion, American space has become increasingly separate. A socio- legal analysis identiﬁes three generations

of spatial segregation in the United States and calls for recognizing the fourth generation—separate, there-

fore equal—in which minority communities require voluntary self- segregation to achieve equality. This

fourth generation of spatial separation requires the law to embrace a protective role, by which it will defend

the ability of minority communities to segregate spatially, the autonomy of individual community members,

and the welfare of the society at large.

Keywords: segregation, “separate but equal,” Kiryas Joel, ultra- Orthodox, First Amendment

“Separate,

Therefore Equal”

Spatial segregation involves the “separation of

socially deﬁned groups in space, such that

members of one group are disproportionately

concentrated in a particular set of geographic

units compared with other groups in the popu-

lation” (Massey, Rothwell, and Domina ,

). Although the segregation of social groups

is present and expressed in a wide range of

ﬁelds and spheres, spatial segregation carries

with it the unique characteristic that every per-

son needs a living space in the ﬁrst instance.

Unlike other spheres, such as education or pub-

      

rsf: the russell sage foundation journal of the social sciences

man ; Myers, Darity, and Marsh ;

Bischoﬀ and Reardon ; Williams and Col-

lins ). Finally, spatial separation presents

unique diﬃculties related to the possible repa-

ration of historical distortions (Rothstein ).

Therefore, although spatial segregation is both

inﬂuenced by and aﬀects the separation of so-

cial groups in other spheres, its unique charac-

teristics enable a distinct socio- legal investiga-

tion into the role of the law in establishing and

maintaining spatial separation. This analysis

enables the identiﬁcation of three generations

of American spatial segregation; in each, the

law plays a diﬀerent role in the construction of

space. The diﬀerent roles the law plays in these

three generations enable the operation of dif-

ferent mechanisms and form a diﬀerent per-

ception of spatial justice (Soja ). Several

caveats are important to recognize. First, this

article is socio- legal and thus does not pretend

to be absolute or ultimate. A socio- legal ap-

proach analyzes the law as directly linked to the

analysis of the social situation to which the law

applies and examines the role that the law plays

in creating, maintaining, and changing the so-

cial situation (Schiﬀ ). Such analysis recog-

nizes other possible classiﬁcations and catego-

rizations of space construction and separation

in American space. Its aim is to contribute to

the understanding of separation in American

society in general and separation in space in

particular, a perspective that enables a discus-

sion on the various functions of law and its im-

pact on society and space. Second, although

analysis of American space cannot ignore the

powerful governmental and private economic

mechanisms used to preserve space separation

(Gotham a; Klarman ; Lamb ;

Massey ; Brooks and Rose ; Rothstein

; Taylor ), the goal here is to provide a

socio- legal examination of spatial processes.

Thus the article does not include in- depth anal-

ysis of the mechanisms and economic mea-

surements that have aﬀected it. The analysis

instead oﬀers a broad- brush characterization

of the role of law in each generation. In each

period, instances sometimes contradict the

main characteristics of the generation. These

instances are discussed as part of the bigger

picture.

   

  

  

The ﬁrst generation of American spatial segre-

gation began with the founding of the United

States and lasted until the Court’s decision in

Plessy v. Ferguson.



Over this extended period,

American society underwent significant

changes and transformations, both politically

and economically. The decision to include this

period within a single generation is based on

the similarities in both the social groups in-

volved and the characteristics of spatial separa-

tion. Throughout the period, racial subordina-

tion was prevalent in most spheres of American

life (Smith ; Omi and Winant ). Rela-

tionships between social groups have been ex-

amined in a prism of slavery, its abolition, and

the social and economic processes that fol-

lowed abolition (Woodward and McFeely ,

; Van Cleve ; Guelzo ; Rael ). Ab-

olition did not end racial subordination in

American society; in fact, in a variety of areas,

subordination remained and even intensiﬁed

(Smith ). It is therefore surprising to ﬁnd

that, in terms of space, separation was relatively

marginal (DuBois ; Weaver ; Bauman

; Woodward and McFeely ). The data

show that until the end of the nineteenth cen-

tury, separation in the American space was rel-

atively low, and separate neighborhoods in ur-

ban or rural environments were not the norm

(Weaver ; Kushner ; Cutler, Glaeser,

and Vigdor ). The literature suggests a

number of explanations for this, the most

prominent being that spatial segregation would

have been an inconvenience and an obstruc-

tion to slavery (Taeuber and Taeuber ;

Woodward and McFeely , ). Recognition

that space was integrated does not contradict

the systematic race- based discrimination and

subordination practiced throughout the ﬁrst

generation; on the contrary, integration was

one of the constitutive components of the ra-

cial subordination system (Woodward and

1. Plessy v. Ferguson, 163 U.S. 537 (1896).

rsf: the russell sage foundation journal of the social sciences

,   

McFeely , ). The role of law in the ﬁrst

generation was therefore less concerned with

racial segregation and more with preserving

and legitimizing racial inequality and subordi-

nation. The spatial concept dominating Amer-

ican space during the ﬁrst generation was thus

“unequal though integrated.” The abolition of

slavery, alongside the ratiﬁcation of the Thir-

teenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amend-

ments to the Constitution between  and

 not only changed the formal legal status

of African Americans throughout the United

States, but also marked a substantive change

in the role the law played in the construction

of space.

This undermining of the racial subordina-

tion system led southern states and local gov-

ernments to create legislation that enforced

racial segregation (Kennedy ). Racial seg-

regation, therefore, enabled white suprema-

cists to preserve the discriminatory and sub-

ordinate racial system that had been lost with

the abolition of slavery and the enactment of

constitutional amendments (Emerson ;

Klarman ; Brown and Webb , –;

Brooks and Rose ). Jim Crow laws man-

dated racial segregation in all public facilities

in southern states from the s and s for-

ward (Brown and Webb ; Woodward and

McFeely , ). In , the Supreme Court

approved the discriminative concept underly-

ing these laws, rejecting constitutional chal-

lenges against the discrimination they would

generate. In Plessy v. Ferguson, the Court estab-

lished the “separate but equal” doctrine, which

suggested that as long as the facilities provided

to each race were equal, state and local govern-

ments could apply policies that separated dif-

ferent races (Klarman ). In this sense,

Plessy v. Ferguson is the mirror image of the

law’s role; whereas the aim in the ﬁrst genera-

tion was to legitimize racial inequality rather

than to be concerned with spatial segregation,

in the second generation, the law, which was

bound to constitutional equality duties, not

only approved but also facilitated racial segre-

gation. Therefore, Plessy v. Ferguson marks the

beginning of the second generation in Ameri-

can spatial separation, in which allegedly

equally funded segregation had become legiti-

mate, if not worthy (Klarman ). Although

Plessy v. Ferguson did not deal with spatial sep-

aration per se, its impact on spatial and resi-

dential separation was signiﬁcant. The reason

is that the ruling—although not directly deal-

ing with spatial separation—established the

principle that guided the Supreme Court

throughout the entire second generation, ac-

cording to which racial segregation, in itself, is

not legally ineligible. Implementing Plessy v.

Ferguson’s insight into the spatial dimension

was accomplished through two landmark 

Supreme Court cases. In Village of Euclid v. Am-

bler Realty Co., the Court provided municipali-

ties with the right to zone land use. The Court

found that the government had a valid interest

in maintaining the character of a neighborhood

and in regulating where certain land uses

should occur. In Corrigan v. Buckley, the Court

ruled that a racially restrictive covenant was a

legally binding document.



These two cases in

corporated Plessy v. Ferguson’s insight regard-

ing the legality of segregation into the spatial

plane and aﬃrmed discriminatory and separa-

tive spatial practices. Data show that American

cities in  were not exceptionally segregated

(Weaver ; Cutler, Glaeser, and Vigdor ).

However, the rapid spread of the Jim Crow laws,

now constitutionally backed by the Supreme

Court, changed the American space, making it

more segregated than it ever had been (Cutler,

Glaeser, and Vigdor ; Massey, Rothwell, and

Domina ). In the South, the abolition of

slavery and the expansion of white supremacy

sentiments increased spatial separation in the

main cities (Taeuber and Taeuber ; Emer-

son ). In the North, where demand for labor

in industrial cities was strong, an inﬂux of

southern African Americans escaping the Jim

Crow laws settled in separate areas within the

cities (Scott ; Cutler, Glaeser, and Vigdor

). The spatial separation in the North was

a result not only of prejudices on the part of

veteran residents, but also economic and social

2. Village of Euclid, Ohio v. Ambler Realty Co., 272 U.S. 365 (1926).

3. Corrigan v. Buckley, 271 U.S. 323 (1926).

      

rsf: the russell sage foundation journal of the social sciences

4. Buchanan v. Warley, 245 U.S. 60 (1917).

5. Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, 347 U.S. 483 (1954).

6. Shelley v. Kraemer, 334 U.S. 1 (1948).

considerations on the part of the migrants

(Weaver ; Lieberson ; Klarman ).

The legal backing for spatial segregation

granted by the Supreme Court in Plessy v. Fer-

guson, Village of Euclid v. Ambler Realty Co., and

Corrigan v. Buckley found expression in a variety

of legal practices, which were designed to es-

tablish and maintain this separation. To pre-

vent racial spatial integration, local govern-

ments made use of racial zoning ordinance

(Aloi, Goldberg, and White ; Rabin ;

Silver ), as well as enforcing racially restric-

tive covenants (Dean ; Jones- Correa ;

Gotham b). Although racial zoning ordi-

nances were declared unconstitutional by the

Supreme Court in Buchanan v. Warley as early

as , courts constantly rejected challenges

to the enforcement of racially restrictive cove-

nants (Brooks and Rose ). These practices

were widespread by , and all the major in-

dustrial centers in the North had ghettos,

which kept African Americans segregated spa-

tially (Massey and Denton ; Cutler, Glaeser,

and Vigdor ). The Supreme Court’s support

for segregation, even if purportedly only with

equal funding, as well as its legitimization of

discriminatory and spatially segregating prac-

tices, made the law an active agent in the imple-

mentation of spatial segregation. In the second

generation, therefore, the law facilitated the

creation and maintenance of racial- based spa-

tial segregation (Klarman ).

The third generation of spatial segregation

began with the Supreme Court’s rejection of

the “separate but equal” doctrine in Brown v.

Board of Education. Aer more than half a cen-

tury of steady rise in the rate of spatial separa-

tion, the Court in Brown ruled that racially

based separation should be considered categor-

ically as discrimination and therefore as uncon-

stitutional. However, it can be argued that this

was only the symbolic beginning of the third

generation, for two reasons. First, although the

“separate but equal” doctrine was oﬃcially re-

jected in Brown, from a spatial perspective, this

ruling was preceded by another in Shelley v.

Kraemer. Here, the Supreme Court forbade ra-

cially restrictive housing covenants, denying

the ability of state authorities, including courts,

to enforce racial segregation, though it was pri-

vately initiated (Brooks and Rose ). As Rich-

ard Rothstein argues, Shelley v. Kraemer was to

spatial segregation what Brown was to educa-

tion (). Second, the ﬁrst practical expres-

sion of the principled determination given in

Brown came only aer more than a decade, in

the enactment of civil rights laws that outlawed

housing discrimination based on race, color,

religion, sex, or national origin. But Brown’s

symbolism is important not only in the ques-

tion of the starting point of the third genera-

tion, but also in the role of the law in perpetu-

ating spatial separation in this generation. The

third generation of American spatial segrega-

tion is distinct from the previous two concern-

ing both the social groups involved and the role

that the law played in perpetuating separation

in space. Unlike the previous generations, the

third generation of American spatial separation

made the issue of separation more extensive in

all aspects related to the social groups involved.

Thus, whereas the ﬁrst two generations focused

on race- and ethnicity- based segregation, the

third expanded the potential for spatial segre-

gation along economic lines (Abramson, Tobin,

and VanderGoot ; Jargowsky ; Massey

and Fischer ; Massey ). Shiing the ba-

sis for spatial separation from race and ethnic-

ity to income widens the circle of those involved

in spatial separation, although diﬀerences in

income level are oen proxies for racial and

ethnic aﬃliation (Reeves, Rodrigue, and Knee-

bone ). This ongoing change in the basis

for segregation, however, was a direct result of

the role the law played in the third generation.

The beginning of the third generation was

encouraging in terms of the role of law in the

construction of space. On a declarative, consti-

tutional level, the law denied the legitimacy of

segregation and established the legal presump-

tion that separation is categorically unequal.

Brown was followed by several important civil

rsf: the russell sage foundation journal of the social sciences

,   

7. Pub.L. 88–352, 78 Stat. 241, enacted July 2, 1964.

8. Pub.L. 90–284, 82 Stat. 73, enacted April 11, 1968.

9. Jones v. Alfred H. Mayer Co., 392 U.S. 409 (1968).

rights laws, which had a signiﬁcant impact on

American society. These laws, especially the

Civil Rights Act of  and the Fair Housing

Act of , changed basic principles in Amer-

ican law and outlawed discrimination with re-

gard to residence or employment on grounds

of race, color, religion, gender, and national

origin. However, although in its constitutional

capacity the law rejected separation and advo-

cated equality, in its private capacity it legiti-

mized separation and arguably turned it into a

constitutive feature of the American space. In

this sense, the law created a gap between the

declarative dimension and the practical one.

The prohibitions on discrimination and segre-

gation, which the law established on a public-

constitutional level, disappeared when they

were implemented in private law. The public-

private distinction was introduced for the ﬁrst

time at Shelley v. Kraemer, which allowed racial

restrictive covenants but forbade their state en-

forcement. However, even aer the enactment

of the Fair Housing Act, which prohibited dis-

crimination on a private level, various exemp-

tions were prescribed in the act itself that al-

lowed the preservation and perpetuation of

spatial separation (Schwemm ; Walsh ;

powell ). These exemptions continue to al-

low spatial separation despite the Supreme

Court ruling in Jones v. Alfred H. Mayer Co.



that

overturned Corrigan v. Buckley and upheld the

constitutionality of the Fair Housing Act. The

public- private distinction led to a number of

signiﬁcant spatial processes, the eﬀects of

which are still evident in the American space.

One of these processes is known as white ﬂight,

the large- scale migration of white populations

from racially mixed urban areas to more racially

homogeneous suburban regions (Frey ;

Conley ; Woldoﬀ ). Although the rea-

sons for the white migration are varied (Frey

), the legal possibility of limiting entry into

residential projects by private proprietary

mechanisms has enabled the preservation of

separation between the suburbs and urban

space (Rothstein ). Another interrelated

spatial process was the ﬂourishing of home-

owners associations (HOAs); private associa-

tions formed for managing residential subdivi-

sion. HOAs were ﬁrst established in the United

States in the mid- nineteenth century but ﬂour-

ished in the third generation of spatial segrega-

tion (Reichman ; Ellickson ; Brooks

and Rose ). Along with the development in

infrastructure and transportation, the main

reason for the frequent use of HOAs since the

s was their identiﬁcation as frameworks for

exclusion and spatial separation, which were

protected by private law (Ellickson ; Massey

and Denton , ; Ford ; Roithmayr

). Another process that has gained momen-

tum since the s is gentriﬁcation; the spatial

process of changing the character of neighbor-

hoods through the inﬂux of more aﬄuent resi-

dents and businesses (Smith ; Lees, Slater,

and Wyly ). Gentriﬁcation oen increases

the economic value of a neighborhood but

forces low- income residents out because of the

increased cost of rent and goods (Smith ;

Boyd ; Goetz ; Lees, Slater, and Wyly

). This involuntary residential displace-

ment of economically weak population groups

is a prominent expression of the third genera-

tion of American spatial segregation (powell

and Spencer ). It is the result of the aban-

donment of space for private law and the mar-

ket forces which, despite the declarations of

integration and equality, establish and perpet-

uate spatial segregation on the ground. The

third generation of American spatial separation

is ongoing; income- based separation is becom-

ing both rooted in the American space and an

integral part of social stratification in the

United States (Massey and Eggers ; Abram-

son, Tobin, and VanderGoot ; Fischer ;

Reardon and Bischoﬀ ). The characteristics

of the three generations of American spatial

separation (table ) reveal signiﬁcant diﬀer-

ences in terms of the basis for separation and

the mechanisms used to implement it.

At the same time however, it seems that the

United States has recently entered the fourth

Table 1. Three Generations of American Spatial Segregation

Generation De Jure De Facto Segregation Bases

Legal Instruments

Applied

Milestone

Supreme Court

Rulings

Segregation

Mechanisms

First Unequal though

integrated

Low-level

segregation

Racial-based

subordination

Thirteenth, Fourteenth,

and Fifteenth

Amendments

Racial subordination

through slavery

Second Separate but equal High-level

segregation

Racial-based

segregation

Jim Crow laws Plessy v.

Ferguson

Separation in public

facilities

transportation,

schools, hotels, and

restaurants

Third Separate is inherently

unequal

High-level

segregation

Racial, ethnic, and

economic based

segregation

Civil Rights Act of



Civil Rights Act of



Shelley v. Kraemer

Brown v. Board of

Education

Private law

mechanisms HOA,

gated communities,

restrictive covenants

Suburbanization and

local policies white

ﬂight

Federal policies

redlining mortgages

Source: Author’s tabulation.

rsf: the russell sage foundation journal of the social sciences

,   

generation of spatial separation, a generation

characterized by the voluntary separation of

minority groups holding a distinct religious or

cultural conception of the good.

    :

   

 

In a referendum held in November  in the

upstate New York town of Monroe, the majority

of residents voted to separate from the village

of Kiryas Joel. This decision ended a long pe-

riod of clashes between the two groups of resi-

dents, which was mainly related to cultural dif-

ferences between the two populations. It also

marked the beginning of the fourth generation

of spatial separation in the United States.

To understand the depth of the diﬀerences

between the two social groups involved, we

need to look closely at the Kiryas Joel commu-

nity and its deﬁning characteristics. Kiryas Joel

was founded in the early s as a semi- rural

outpost of the Satmar Hasidic sect based in

Brooklyn, and grew rapidly, creating the need

for multifamily housing and additional land for

it (Stolzenberg ; Grumet, Caher, and Kaye

). The Satmar are the largest, most devoted

Hasidic community in America (Mintz ; Ru-

bin ). Even among ultra- Orthodox sects, it

is considered one of the most zealous in its im

plementation of Jewish law and opposition to

reforms or innovation (Magid ; Wood and

Watt ). The Satmar brought their way of life

with them from Hungary to Brooklyn aer

World War II, where the separation of religion

and state, combined with Brooklyn’s housing

opportunities, enabled the expanding Satmar

community and other Central European Jewish

immigrants to establish isolated, illiberal com-

munities that functioned independently of

many state- regulated structures (Rubin ).

Satmar families, eschewing birth control, typi-

cally have eight to ten children (Mintz ;

Wood and Watt ; Stolzenberg ). They

speak Yiddish, dress in long clothes to avoid

revealing body parts in public, engage in full

gender separation outside the home, and gen-

erally refrain from consuming American media

or publications that do not come from within

the community (Minow ).

The Satmar community proliferated so rap-

idly that lack of housing acted as a catalyst for

the  establishment of the second location

of the Satmar sect in the town of Monroe, New

York. This community was named Kiryas Joel

(Stolzenberg ; Minow ; Myers ).

The establishment of the village of Kiryas Joel

symbolized not only a split in the American Sat-

mar community but also a turning point in the

community’s struggle for spatial separation

(Stolzenberg ; Minow ; Myers ).

The village saw value in convergence within it-

self, providing for its needs autonomously, and

maintaining spatial and social separation from

external populations. These characteristics nat-

urally led to a distance between residents of the

village of Kiryas Joel and residents of the town

of Monroe, so that even before the referendum

on municipal separation, the residents of

Kiryas Joel were spatially and culturally sepa-

rated. At the same time, attempts to obtain le-

gal approval for this separation were repeatedly

rejected.

The most striking legal confrontation con-

cerned the Kiryas Joel residents’ aspirations to

establish a separate and independent board of

education. Although most of the village chil-

dren attended private schools that were gender

segregated in accordance with the religious

norms of the community, the children who had

disabilities were sent to a Monroe public

school. Because of Monroe’s refusal to gender

segregate its public school, the New York legis-

lature authorized Kiryas Joel to establish a pub-

lic school that would serve the village’s children

with disabilities. Citizen taxpayers and the New

York School Board Association sued, claiming

that the statute creating this special school dis-

trict was not neutral and violated the require-

ment to separate church and state as mandated

by the First Amendment. The case went to the

Supreme Court, which in Board of Ed. of Kiryas

Joel Village School Dist. v. Grumet ruled that the

special school district gave too much authority

over a secular function of society to a religious

group and unconstitutionally delegated a secu

lar function to a religious body. The New York

legislature responded by adopting new legisla-

tion that appeared to be more general and more

neutral, but the suit was also taken to the Su-

preme Court. The Grumet case is one promi-

nent example among many of the tension be-

      

rsf: the russell sage foundation journal of the social sciences

tween the two social groups, which arose from

fundamental diﬀerences in their worldviews

and ways of life. The case also attests to the fact

that spatial and cultural separation existed be-

tween the village of Kiryas Joel and the town of

Monroe even before the  referendum. How-

ever, I argue that the municipal separation, to

which both the residents of Monroe and the

residents of Kiryas Joel agreed, marked a new

era of spatial separation in the United States.

The reason for seeing Kiryas Joel’s case as

the beginning of the fourth generation of

American spatial separation is not that the sep-

aration between the groups was allegedly vol-

untary. Consider another case of an alleged vol-

untary separation—St. George and East Baton

Rouge Parish, Louisiana. In October , aer

years of trying to create a separate school sys-

tem, residents of a white suburb of Baton

Rouge voted to become a new city called St.

George. Fiy- four percent of voters in the com-

munity approved the amendment, but other

Baton Rouge residents were not allowed to ex-

press their position (due to state laws). St.

George was accordingly incorporated as a sep-

arate city and gained control over its taxes and

schools (Wilson ). Although the case of St.

George is timely and occurs, expectedly or not,

in Louisiana, which has been the focus of

Plessy v. Ferguson, it is not a unique case. Ac-

cording to recent research, most of the cases

in which communities aim to self- segregate

themselves from their parish do so to control

their taxes and school systems (Wilson ;

EdBuild ; Taylor, Frankenberg, and Siegel-

Hawley ). Thus, states set diﬀerent statu-

tory processes for school district secessions

that isolate students and resources (Shoked

; Wilson ; EdBuild ). Thirty states

have a policy deﬁned in law. Some require ac-

tions by voters; others require the state’s ap-

proval and even constitutional amendment.

Since , no fewer than seventy- three U.S.

communities have attempted to secede from

schools in an eﬀort to strengthen resources

(EdBuild ). Some, like St. George, aimed to

achieve school segregation by promoting mu-

nicipal secession.

The case of St. George and similar commu-

nities that struggle to segregate themselves

from their less aﬄuent surrounding parishes

should not be considered as part of the fourth

generation because for the most part they have

maintained the characteristics of segregation

in previous generations. Thus, St. George, a

largely white and more aﬄuent suburb of Baton

Rouge, seeks to separate spatially from the ma-

jority of nonwhite, less aﬄuent residents of the

East Baton Rouge Parish (Runnels ). Spatial

separation is promoted by the powerful to

avoid integration with the less powerful on ra-

cial and economic grounds. These are precisely

the characteristics of the separation against

which the Brown Court came out, and the same

bases for separation in the post- Brown genera-

tion. Therefore, seeing such a separation, de-

spite being ostensibly voluntary, as one that

deserves any protection cannot be justiﬁed.

The case of Kiryas Joel, however, is quite dif-

ferent.

The reason to view the municipal separation

of Kiryas Joel and the town of Monroe as the

beginning of the fourth generation of American

spatial segregation is that it altered the roles of

the social groups involved as well as the legal

and social implications of this decision. The

oﬃcial separation of the village from the town

created, in practice, the ﬁrst town in the United

States exclusively for ultra- Orthodox Jews. Mov-

ing to the present day, the new town of Palm

Tree is expected to be run according to the rules

and the religious norms held by residents of

Kiryas Joel. These norms, as well as the charac-

teristics of the residents, are expected to aﬀect

the town’s zoning laws—to emphasize apart-

ments for large families as well as the provision

of public institutions for study and ritual—and

the educational institutions and the norms ac-

cording to which they will operate (Minow

). Therefore, the establishment of Palm

Tree marks the emergence of a new generation

of segregation in the American space, one that

diﬀers from the three generations that pre-

ceded it. This fourth generation is not based on

race, religion, ethnicity, or income. Instead, the

social groups involved are, respectively, a ma-

jority group in American society and a minority

community that seeks to live in accordance

with its unique, oen illiberal norms. In the

case of Kiryas Joel, the group is deﬁned as a

minority because of its religious aﬃliation, but

future cases that rely on the Kiryas Joel prece-

rsf: the russell sage foundation journal of the social sciences

,   

dent will not necessarily be limited to religious

minorities. Indeed, the fourth generation pro-

vides the opportunity for various minority com-

munities—religious, ethnic, cultural, and even

economic—to demand spatial separation from

the majority group. Focusing on the majority-

minority tension justiﬁes viewing the Satmar

community’s struggle for spatial segregation as

manifesting a fourth generation of American

spatial separation and not just as another link

in the historical chain of religious communities

seeking to diﬀerentiate on a religious basis.

American history is replete with multiple strug-

gles on behalf of religious communities to

maintain their religious practices and to pre-

serve their religious freedom. Kiryas Joel’s sep-

aration illustrates a broader struggle for spatial

autonomy that does not settle for religious free-

dom but instead demands a spatial expression

of government.

Placing the majority- minority tension at the

core of the fourth generation of American spa-

tial segregation, however, requires us to recog-

nize that Kiryas Joel is not the ﬁrst case where

this tension was the basis for a claim. African

American separatists opposed integration and

called for the concept of self- segregation of

blacks out of community empowerment (Ham-

ilton and Ture ; Hall ; Pettigrew ).

In the late nineteenth and early twentieth cen-

turies, African American activists established

several black- only towns, believing that blacks

would never ﬁnd peace or prosperity living in

white- dominated areas. The assumption be-

hind such towns—such as Boley and Langston

in Oklahoma and Mound Bayou in Missis-

sippi—was that only by controlling the govern-

mental institutions would the empowerment

of the community be possible (Meier ; Tol-

son ; Stuckey ). Almost a century later,

minority communities in East Palo Alto, Cali-

fornia, and Boston, Massachusetts, made sev-

eral eﬀorts to incorporate as independent mu-

nicipalities (Goel et al. ). These attempts,

though abandoned eventually, were symptom-

atic of the negative reaction to the implementa-

tion of integration that had been guaranteed

by law in the third generation of American spa-

tial segregation, as well as the desire to assert

political control over their community (Goel et

al. ). However, these separatist calls and

self- segregation attempts were rejected, either

because of the belief that segregation is un-

equal and inappropriate or a more practical un-

derstanding that granting such a possibility

would make it possible to preserve the discrim-

inatory situation in eﬀect at the time. The fail-

ure of previous self- segregation attempts,

therefore, should be attributed to the message

conveyed by both Plessy v. Ferguson and Brown

v. Board of Education. Although these two judg-

ments did not deal directly with spatial separa-

tion, they did link separation and equality. In

that sense, the judgments made segregation

the ultimate cause for inequality in American

society. Although the place of racial- , religious-,

ethnic- , or income- based segregation in creat-

ing and preserving inequality in American so-

ciety is undisputable, labeling it as the ultimate

and perhaps even the only cause of inequality

is problematic for two reasons. First, it hides

other political, economic, and social causes of

inequality and therefore prevents those causes

from being identiﬁed and treated. Second, and

more important, it does not allow for a more

distinct observation of the circumstances of

each case (Bayer, Fang, and McMillan ). Set-

ting an irrefutable presumption that segrega-

tion is unequal denies claims for spatial separa-

tion that may not only not harm equality but

instead—as in self- segregation claims on behalf

of suppressed minority communities—en-

hance it.

The Kiryas Joel case changed this common

understanding by allowing minority communi-

ties to segregate themselves voluntarily from

general American society. In this sense, the

fourth generation opens anew the discussion

about the applicability of the Plessy v. Fergu-

son’s “separate but equal” doctrine in American

spatial policy. However, it not only reinforces

the debate but also suggests that the imple-

mentation of this doctrine may be legitimate

and even desired if a minority community re-

quests it. The fourth generation, therefore,

presents a diﬀerent concept of spatial justice

in which a separate space may be required for

a minority community to gain equality. Spatial

separation, therefore, is no longer an obstacle

to equality but instead a condition for it—in

other words, “separate, therefore equal.” This

is, of course, a meaningful change in the Amer-

      

rsf: the russell sage foundation journal of the social sciences

10. United States v. Fordice, 505 U.S. 717 (1992).

ican spatial policy, one that has both legal and

social implications.

Kiryas Joel was the ﬁrst town to be incorpo-

rated as an ultra- Orthodox- only settlement, but

many other towns face a similar threat. The ex-

perience of New York towns such as East Ra-

mapo and Bloomingburg and New Jersey towns

such as Riverdale, Mahwah, Jackson, Upper

Saddle River, and Montvale is much the same

as what led to Kiryas Joel’s municipal separa-

tion. In all these cases, the ultra- Orthodox com-

munity argues that segregation will reﬂect

justice and equality by serving the unique com-

munity’s needs. “Separate, therefore equal” is

slowly becoming a normative claim for spatial

justice for many communities (see table A).

The return to the forefront of the legitimate

connection between separation and equality in

space poses signiﬁcant legal challenges and re-

quires investigation of its implications for so-

ciety as a whole, for the segregated community,

and for the individual members of the commu-

nity. This examination must be based on argu-

ments about the justiﬁcations of or objections

to the spatial separation of minority communi-

ties, as discussed in the following section.

  -

  

Can the spatial segregation of minority com-

munities, especially those organized around il-

liberal norms, be socially and legally justiﬁed?

Should the liberal state allow such segregation,

or should it struggle to prevent it? Should the

fact that the segregation is voluntary aﬀect the

answer to these questions?

Stronger Alone: Empowerment

Minorities have oen been the victims of spa-

tial and residential segregation (Nelson ;

Seitles ). As Douglas Massey, Jonathan

Rothwell, and Thurston Domina demonstrate,

minorities such as African Americans, Latinos,

and Asians were the most prominent victims of

spatial separation, based, at least until the

s, on race and ethnicity (; Jennings

). The change in the characteristics of

American spatial segregation, from that based

on race and ethnicity to that based on income,

did not signiﬁcantly change the location of mi-

norities in this equation. Then, as today, mi-

norities in American society lived with spatial

exclusion (Yinger ; Seitles ; Trifun

) as well as repeated attempts by govern-

ment and private parties to create spatial sepa-

ration (Trifun ). The social and legal battle

to diminish racial and ethnic spatial segrega-

tion in the United States was primarily the bat-

tle of minorities seeking to be considered as

equals in society (Valocchi ). The rejection

of the “separate but equal” doctrine has been a

signiﬁcant yet symbolic milestone in the strug-

gle for equality for minorities in the United

States, in eﬀect declaring that a worthy society

cannot legitimize separation between people

because of their racial, ethnic, or religious dif-

ference. The Court’s legal declaration in Brown

celebrates equality and inclusiveness. It failed

to recognize, however, that sometimes spatial

separation empowers minorities instead of

marginalizing them.

Attempts to prevent racial and ethnic spatial

segregation over the years led both state and

local governments to adopt inclusive spatial

policies, such as subsidized housing, inclusion-

ary zoning, and restrictions on discrimination.

In response to these eﬀorts, some scholars ar-

gue that in the quest for equality, the right of

minorities to not integrate was obscured. The

law, as expressed in the Supreme Court ruling

in United States v. Fordice—where Justice Clar-

ence Thomas’s concurring opinion suggesting

that historically black colleges should not be

destroyed or severed of their traditions and

histories was not adopted by the opinion of

the Court—showed little tolerance for these

claims. However, scholars as well as social ac-

tivists suggest that in some cases segregation

may be desirable (Jennings ). Take, for ex-

ample, a situation in which integration strips

the minority community of essential character-

istics, history, and values (Goel et al. ; Jen-

nings ). Another argument is that separa-

tion may in times empower minorities, whether

because they are able to preserve their history

and values, or because they may develop a

sense of belonging and social aﬃliation (Brooks

; Tomlins ; Kaplan and Woodhouse

rsf: the russell sage foundation journal of the social sciences

,   

). The empowerment justiﬁcation was at

the core of both the black separatism move-

ment of the s and the incorporation at-

tempts of black communities in the s.

These arguments still ﬁnd expression in the re-

cent flourishing of Afrocentric schools in

Brooklyn, New York. Approximately six Afro-

centric schools in Brooklyn, in which about

, children are enrolled, decided to provide

African American children with an educa-

tional framework that would celebrate black

culture and history. As Raﬁq Kalam Id- Din II,

the founder of the Ember Charter School, de-

scribed its mission, “Everything you do needs

to be focused on agency and empowerment”

(Shapiro ).

Segregation as empowerment justiﬁes spa-

tial segregation when it contributes to a minor-

ity’s ability to ﬂourish. This understanding

echoes some of the arguments on behalf of

multiculturalism, which support limited segre-

gation of minorities from general society. How-

ever, the empowerment justiﬁcation depends

on the characteristics of the community and

the need, insofar as it exists, for spatial segrega-

tion to preserve those characteristics. Such a

demand must come from the minority commu-

nity and cannot be imposed by an external

party (Goel et al. ). The signiﬁcance of these

qualiﬁcations is that the empowerment justiﬁ-

cation for spatial segregation cannot and

should not be broadly exercised. It requires a

careful examination of the circumstances of

each case and the characteristics of each com-

munity.

Live and Let Live: Pluralism

Another justiﬁcation for the spatial segregation

of minority communities is rooted in a funda-

mental pluralistic approach, which imposes a

duty on liberal states to allow all citizens to live

their lives in accordance with whatever concept

of good they deem appropriate (Anderson ;

Stern ). At the core of this approach is the

understanding that every person may hold dif-

ferent beliefs and values. Elizabeth Anderson

identiﬁes this principle, saying that “people ex-

perience the world as infused with many diﬀer-

ent values” (, ). She also explains that the

state should therefore be obligated to allow all

people to live by their values through the estab-

lishment of diverse social institutions, which

people can use to promote these values (Ander-

son ; Stern ). Anderson thus argues

that the state has an obligation “to expand the

range of signiﬁcant opportunities open to its

citizens by supporting institutions that enable

them to govern themselves by the norms inter-

nal to the modes of valuation appropriate to

diﬀerent kinds of goods” (, ).

Applying Anderson’s pluralistic approach to

the spatial discourse means that the liberal

state must be prepared to allow spatial segrega-

tion if it contributes to individuals’ actualiza-

tion of their values and norms (Stolzenberg

). It also requires the state to preserve the

ability of all individuals and communities to

realize their values and norms and therefore

should be done in a way that prevents external-

izing one group’s norms over another’s (Stern

). The case of Kiryas Joel is a good example

of the pluralistic justification. The ultra-

Orthodox community of Kiryas Joel maintains

strict adherence to halakhah (Jewish religious

law), which aﬀects all aspects of their lives,

from spiritual concepts to everyday life (Mintz

; Norgren and Nanda ). To maintain

their religious worldview in accord with the

community, members of the community can-

not integrate with institutions in general soci-

ety (Rubin ). It was no accident that the

main legal event in which the Kiryas Joel com-

munity was involved had to do with the schools

to which the community sent its children (Ru-

bin ). A community that meticulously pre-

serves gender segregation in its schools cannot

exercise its religious worldview if the commu-

nity’s children enroll in mixed- gender institu-

tions (Mintz ). It should not be surprising,

therefore, that the tension related to the edu-

cational institutions between the residents of

Monroe and the residents of Kiryas Joel eventu-

ally led to a decision on separation. Thus the

community’s requirements for maintaining its

values and norms give rise to the pluralistic jus-

tiﬁcation for spatial segregation.

The pluralistic justiﬁcation and the empow-

erment justiﬁcation have certain similarities.

Both seek to enable communities to preserve

their characteristics, values, and norms. Nei-

ther applies to forced spatial segregation, but

instead conditions separation on the commu-

      

rsf: the russell sage foundation journal of the social sciences

nity’s free will or demand. However, the two

justiﬁcations also diﬀer. The most prominent

of these diﬀerences relates to the characteris-

tics of communities that may require spatial seg-

regation. The empowerment justiﬁcation holds

that only minority communities that have his-

torically experienced oppression, discrimina-

tion, and exclusion by a majority population

should be permitted to implement spatial seg-

regation in the name of empowerment. The le-

gitimization of spatial segregation, a policy per-

ceived as discriminatory and socially harmful,

stems from a long history of discrimination

and exclusion. According to this justiﬁcation,

minority communities can now correct past in-

justices by using tools to which they are accus-

tomed. It is diﬀerent, however, if the pluralistic

justiﬁcation is examined. The pluralistic justi-

ﬁcation holds that spatial segregation is not

unique to minority communities. Any commu-

nity whose unique characteristics and ability to

realize that its members’ worldview requires

spatial separation should be permitted to do

so. Whereas the empowerment justiﬁcation is

based primarily on using the past to construct

the future, the pluralistic justiﬁcation aims

mainly to foster the ability of communities to

function properly in the present.

Good Fences Make Good

Neighbors: Utilitarianism

Another way to justify spatial segregation both

in general and between particular communities

is utilitarian. This justiﬁcation assumes that

the inability of two or more parties to reach an

agreement about the proper use or manage-

ment of shared resources requires division and

separation (Ostrom ). This assumption un

derlies Garrett Hardin’s “tragedy of the com-

mons” (), in which he advocates adopting

a private property regime rather than a com-

mon one (Demsetz ; Hardin ). To over-

come the collective action problem in regard to

shared resources, and to avoid ineﬃciency, it

would be better to divide ownership of the re-

source so that each owner is able to use and

manage their own plot efficiently (Ostrom

). This rationale, which calls for division

and separation to ensure eﬃciency, may also

justify spatial separation between diﬀerent

communities. When communities holding dis-

tinctly diﬀerent values and norms are required

to share resources, such as schools, they may

face ongoing conﬂicts that prevent any of them

from deriving the proper and desired beneﬁt of

those institutions.

This argument also holds true for decision

making in the design of common space. Con-

sider the various needs of the Monroe and the

Kiryas Joel populations. Those of the Monroe

population were more or less identical to those

of any average American community, but those

of Kiryas Joel were quite diﬀerent. The large

number of children per family, the gender seg-

regation in educational institutions and the

public sphere, and their need for various insti-

tutions of worship all led to ongoing conﬂicts

regarding local zoning and the characteristics

of public institutions. From the utilitarian

point of view, these confrontations and there-

fore this partnership were undesirable. Pro-

tracted confrontations between parties not

only caused signiﬁcant delays in the satisfac-

tion of public needs but also resulted in the

failure to satisfy either side. Economic losses

related to litigation or constant threats of it

were a factor (Trubek et al. ; Ribstein ),

as was frustration on all sides with the inability

to implement programs and services (Michel-

man ) that, in a sense, paralyzed the shared

city. These costs, all embedded in the collective

action problem, militate for the separation of

communities that have been paralyzed and de-

pleted by costly sharing. In this sense, spatial

segregation may eﬃciently ease tensions and

confrontations among communities, or, as one

Kiryas Joel oﬃcial said, “We can each have our

own town and be good neighbors.”

The empowerment and pluralistic justiﬁca-

tions have numerous similarities, but the utili-

tarian justiﬁcation involves a completely diﬀer-

ent view. According to it, segregation should

also be implemented if one of the communities

using a common space does not wish to imple-

ment it. The reasoning here lies in the perspec-

tive that characterizes utilitarian perceptions,

which is the consideration of aggregate welfare,

regardless of the will of those who make up the

equation. This aspect of the utilitarian justiﬁca-

tion has the potential to facilitate the imposi-

tion of spatial segregation on various commu-

nities, ignoring their characteristics and the

rsf: the russell sage foundation journal of the social sciences

,   

implications of that separation on the conduct

of the community. In a sense, the utilitarian

justification’s disregard for the volitional

choice of spatial segregation is reminiscent of

the dark ages, when racial segregation was jus-

tiﬁed for utilitarian reasons, in service of per-

ceived aggregate welfare (Hayman ; Klar-

man ). These and other objections are the

focus of the next section, which explains the

reasons for opposing spatial separation.

  - 

 

Each of the three justiﬁcations for spatial seg-

regation, though diﬀering in scope and scale of

application, holds that communities should be

allowed to segregate spatially in certain circum-

stances. Whether because segregation is re-

quired to empower long oppressed communi-

ties, because of its essential role in preserving

a community’s norms and values, or because it

contributes to the aggregate welfare, spatial

segregation may be legitimized despite its

moral ﬂaws and its historic role in fostering dis-

crimination.

Inﬂuences on Society

One objection to legitimizing it, despite its po-

tential contribution to minority communities

or to society generally, is that it imposes costs

and inappropriate norms. This objection has

multiple layers. The ﬁrst, oen referred to as

the slippery slope argument, suggests that le-

gitimizing spatial separation will not success-

fully be restricted within deﬁned boundaries,

as in the case of a voluntary demand of a minor-

ity community. Instead, it will cross borders

and expanses, eventually spreading to the en-

tire American space (Kymlicka , ).

According to this view, even under the alleg-

edly egalitarian spatial policies of the third gen

eration of spatial segregation, racist and dis-

criminatory attitudes remain, if dormant.

Widening the prohibitions on segregation in

public law has led to discriminatory and racist

views being expressed mainly through market

forces and private law. Reinstating the possibil-

ity of spatial separation could, on a public level,

therefore incite racist and discriminatory be-

haviors, and drive spatial segregation even in

situations for which no justiﬁcation is possible.

In a sense, the slippery slope argument seeks

to prevent the return of America to the second

generation, in which spatial separation was le-

gitimate and justiﬁed in various ways by a large

portion of the population (Edmonds ). Spa-

tial separation should therefore be prohibited

now just as it has been.

A second aspect of the inﬂuence objection

concerns the possibility that community

norms, for the sake of which the community

has separated from society, will bleed into the

common space outside the community. Com-

munal norms will cross the boundaries of the

community and aﬀect the external space. For

example, it is possible that diﬀerent religious

or cultural norms, some of which could conﬂict

with liberal norms such as gender segregation

and gender discrimination, would aﬀect the lib-

eral space outside the community. The com-

munity that diﬀerentiates itself spatially in or-

der to continue and even intensify its practices

of nonliberal norms within its discrete com-

munal space will, somewhat paradoxically, ex-

ert greater inﬂuence on the general space from

which it withdrew (Stolzenberg ). Although

it is possible to argue that communities such

as Kiryas Joel exercised nonliberal norms even

before separating from the town of Monroe,

separation increases its ability to do so, both in

terms of enforcement and scope, because seg-

regation facilitates the practice of nonliberal

norms in the public sphere. The inﬂuence ob-

jection, then, calls for the prohibition of spatial

separation in the fourth generation out of con-

cern that such separation would impose im-

proper costs and norms in the space around

the community.

Harm to Community Members’ Autonomy

A diﬀerent objection to legitimizing spatial

segregation stems from a concern for the in-

dividual autonomy of members of the segre-

gated community (Buchanan ; Pildes ;

Dagan and Heller ). According to this argu-

ment, the three justiﬁcations for spatial segre-

gation ignore both the interests of individual

members of the community and their auton-

omy. The objection to spatial segregation out

of concern for the individual autonomy of com-

munity members recognizes that communi-

ties, although important to their members,

      

rsf: the russell sage foundation journal of the social sciences

may violate their autonomy to the point of

claiming that individuals will sacriﬁce them-

selves for the sake of the community. In such

cases, communities, however important they

may be, can eﬀectively become prisons for in-

dividuals.

Spatial segregation does not create commu-

nities or shape their characteristics. The vari-

ous justiﬁcations discussed earlier refer to ex-

isting communities that seek to diﬀerentiate

themselves spatially. However, spatial separa-

tion of the community from other communi-

ties intensiﬁes, or is likely to intensify, the vio-

lation of the autonomy of individual members

of the community, for two reasons (Stern ).

First, spatial segregation empowers the com-

munity as a whole and its leaders in particular

(Phillips ). Empowering community lead-

ers creates the potential for further reduction

of individual autonomy, subordinating the in-

dividual’s discretion to the directives of lead-

ership. Second, and equally important, spatial

segregation creates a barrier between those

who belong to the community and those who

do not. This barrier, although it may have ex-

isted socially or covertly when the communi-

ties intertwined, prevents individual members

of the community from being exposed to other

norms and to those who believe in them (Stern

). Exposure to alternatives generally devel-

ops the ability to think autonomously. As

noted, this barrier also reduces the ability of

individual members of the community to

create social, economic, and cultural aﬃlia-

tions with those who do not belong to the com-

munity, and thus has a chilling eﬀect on their

ability to exit the community as they choose

(Simmel ; Bolt, Burgers, and Van Kempen

).

The Utilitarian Objection

Another objection to the spatial segregation of

minority communities involves society as a

whole. This utilitarian objection has many as-

pects, the common denominator of which is

the conclusion that granting legitimacy for spa-

tial segregation may harm aggregate welfare

(Glyn and Miliband ; Carr and Kutty ).

One suggests that segregation involves an in-

herent reduction in the ability of isolated com-

munities to maximize their economic activity.

Another is that spatial segregation creates en-

claves that, over time, will become completely

disconnected from general society, so that so-

ciety loses signiﬁcant forces that might other-

wise contribute to aggregate welfare. The ﬁrst

objection focuses on the segregated communi-

ties and the implications of spatial separation

on their economic situation. Most of the re-

search regarding the economic implications

suggests that segregation leads to severe con-

sequences for the separatist community and its

members (Massey, Gross, and Eggers ;

Massey and Fischer ; Wilson ). These

consequences are the result of poor education,

poor health, and lack of training and mobility,

but also stem from the lack of economic ties

with nonmembers (Massey, Gross, and Eggers

; Massey and Denton ; Massey and

Fischer ). Segregation impairs the eco-

nomic strength of the community because it

radically restricts the opportunities available

to its members. An examination of the ultra-

Orthodox communities in the New York area

reveals that their economic conditions are sig-

niﬁcantly worse than those of the national and

state average. According to the – Amer-

ican Community Survey, all- ultra- Orthodox

communities, such as Kaser, New Square, and

Palm Tree, have per capita incomes one-

quarter to one- third of the state average and

poverty rates three to four times that of the

state. The childhood poverty in these commu-

nities is almost three times that of the state

(U.S. Census Bureau , annex ). From a util-

itarian point of view, the economic weakness

of the community is not expected to remain

an intracommunal problem. Communities

that collapse impose a heavy economic burden

on the state to subsidize and support them

through various educational, health, and reha-

bilitation programs (Massey and Denton ).

The concern for economic damage, then, justi-

ﬁes its prevention from a utilitarian point of

view. However, the utilitarian objection has a

second aspect, which is related to the disen-

gagement of those segments of the population

from general society. According to this argu-

ment, the state’s labor capacity and productiv-

ity are impaired when segments of the labor

force disengage. The spatial segregation of mi-

nority communities may lead to enclaves be-

rsf: the russell sage foundation journal of the social sciences

,   

coming completely detached from the general

economic activity in the country as a whole.

Whereas earlier this concern was the motive

for increasing mobility and improvements in

the ways in which minority groups were inte-

grated into the economy, complete separation

implemented voluntarily by the community to-

day can lead to the loss of signiﬁcant parts of

the labor force, thus harming aggregate wel-

fare.

,  :

    

As discussed, in each of the three previous gen-

erations, the law played a diﬀerent role regard-

ing separation in space. In the ﬁrst generation,

it functioned as the guardian of racial subordi-

nation through the institution of slavery and

was therefore indiﬀerent to spatial separation.

In the second generation, aer the abolition of

slavery, it preserved white supremacy, legitimiz-

ing and even facilitating spatial segregation. In

the third generation, it became a constituent

component of spatial separation, because de-

spite its declarations regarding the prohibition

on separation, it supported and expanded its

existence through private law and market

forces. The fourth- generation characteristics

no longer allow the law to continue playing a

dual role in the same way. Incorporation as a

municipality prevents minority communities

from continuing to use private law as a method

of segregation and discrimination. The choice

to incorporate as a municipality changes the

status of those communities, shiing them

from private to public law. The meaning of in-

corporation as municipalities goes beyond at-

tempts of individuals and private developers to

exclude others and forces the law to consider

the implications of such segregation on the

community, its individual members, and soci-

ety at large. The justiﬁcations and objections

for spatial separation in the fourth generation

require that the law intervene in the construc-

tion of space and play a major, protective role

in maintaining the boundaries of separation

and its consequences.

Three constitutional challenges require a re-

thinking of the role of the law in establishing

the separate, therefore equal policy. The ﬁrst

lies in the connection that fourth- generation

spatial segregation creates between commu-

nity authority and government authority. Such

a connection expands the authority given to

community leaders, therefore extending the

threat posed to the autonomy of individual

community members, as well as their constitu-

tional rights. The second challenge is the role

of the law in ensuring the ability of a minority

community to maintain its activities and char-

acteristics. This challenge sharpens when the

community that seeks to segregate spatially is

a religious community, a reality that evokes the

Establishment Clause of the First Amendment

and concerns state contribution to the estab-

lishment of religion. The third challenge relates

to the protection that the law should provide to

those who are not community members. In this

context, the law should accommodate the con-

cern that spatial segregation of minority com-

munities will establish discriminatory norms

between those who are members of the com-

munity and those who are not; for example, in

the ﬁelds of housing, employment, and educa-

tion. Protecting the community, the individual

community members and society at large,

therefore becomes a signiﬁcant part of deﬁning

the role of the law in the fourth generation of

spatial separation.

The Role of Law in Protecting

Community Members

The ﬁrst challenge the fourth generation of spa-

tial segregation poses before the law is the ex-

tension of the authority and power of the com-

munity and its leaders. If before incorporating

as a municipality the community beneﬁted

mostly from community forces, which were

based on internal community norms main-

tained primarily by social sanctions, its incor-

poration as a municipality adds a governmen-

tal layer to the variety of methods available to

the community and its leaders when seeking to

impose their judgment on community mem-

bers. In this sense, empowering a minority

community to be incorporated as a municipal-

ity connects community authority and govern-

ing authority, a connection that raises concern

about the preservation of the autonomy and

constitutional rights of the community mem-

bers. One example of such a challenge may be

the design of public space in accordance with

      

rsf: the russell sage foundation journal of the social sciences

11. Board of Ed. of Kiryas Joel Village School Dist. v. Grumet, 512 U.S. 687 (1994).

12. Kiryas Joel Village School Dist., 512 U.S. 687 (Scalia, A., dissenting).

community norms. In , the New York Civil

Liberties Union and the American Civil Liber-

ties Union sued the village of Kiryas Joel aer

press reports documented a public park in

which women and girls were conﬁned to an

area with red benches and playground equip-

ment, with boys and men to a blue area. The

lawsuit was settled aer the town of Monroe

government agreed not to endorse segregation

of the sexes in the public sphere. However, the

separation of Kiryas Joel from Monroe raised

concerns that providing governing powers to

the Satmar community would reawaken its

leaders’ desire to shape the public sphere to

align with community norms. Another chal-

lenge concerns the enforcement of community

norms through governing powers. In this

sense, the concern is that establishing the con-

nection between community authority and gov-

ernment authority would extend the violation

of the autonomy of individual community

members, especially when it comes to their

right to oppose the leadership, to protest

against it, and to suggest alternatives to a path

chosen by the community leadership. These

concerns become more acute because the sanc-

tions held by the municipal government are no

longer informal, social sanctions, but instead

governmental and legal ones.

The concerns reinforce the notion that the

law should play a protective role that would

protect individual members of the community

from extending the infringement to their au-

tonomy, as well as from the loss of their consti-

tutional rights. To fulﬁll its protective role, the

law should address these concerns primarily

through strict adherence to the constitutional

rights of the community members, emphasiz-

ing the rights enumerated in the First Amend-

ment: freedom of expression, freedom of

speech, and freedom of association. Thus any

attempt by the municipal government to re-

strict or limit the exercise of individual mem-

bers’ constitutional rights should be under

strict scrutiny and under the assumption that

the restrictions on these rights should be re-

duced as far as possible. When illiberal minor-

ity communities incorporate as municipalities,

they bind together both communal and gov-

erning authorities. This consolidation of pow-

ers diminishes the ability of individuals, as

community members, to exercise their auton-

omy. If community members who violated

community codes were primarily subject to

community and social sanctions until the com-

munity’s incorporation as a municipality, they

would be subject to government sanctions aer

incorporation. The unification of powers,

therefore, sharpens the importance of the role

of law as the protector of community members’

rights.

     

 

 - 

The Establishment Clause is a limitation

placed on governments to prevent actions that

may contribute to the establishment of reli-

gion, making it illegal for the government to

promote theocracy or a speciﬁc religion. Gov-

ernment support for spatially segregated reli-

gious minority communities could trigger Es-

tablishment Clause concerns because the

segregation could be seen as a way of realizing

religious community norms. This question was

at the core of the Grumet case, in which the New

York legislature’s special state statute estab-

lished a separate board of education along the

village boundaries of Kiryas Joel to serve this

distinctive religious population. Justice David

Souter reached the conclusion that the legisla-

tors’ decision, one counter to regular state

practice, was undermining the state’s constitu-

tional obligation to act in neutrality, therefore

violating the Establishment Clause. Although

the ruling in Grumet was widely criticized (Mi-

now ; Greene ),



it seems that the chal-

lenge that the Establishment Clause poses to

fourth generation spatial segregation claims

should be examined diﬀerently. As noted, the

fourth- generation of spatial separation does

not necessarily concern religious communities

exclusively, though it is reasonable to assume

that these may play a major role in community

quests for segregation. Instead, the main char-

acteristic of the community that seeks to seg-

rsf: the russell sage foundation journal of the social sciences

,   

13. Employment Division, Department of Human Resources of Oregon v. Smith, 494 U.S. 872 (1990).

14. 42 U.S.C. § 2000bb.

regate itself voluntarily is that it is a minority

community. An examination of the justiﬁca-

tions for spatial separation also reveals that

none are unique to religious communities. All

three justiﬁcations may apply to religious com-

munities but do not depend on religious aﬃli-

ation, only concerns relating to minority status.

A decision on whether the state should permit,

support, or regulate self- segregated communi-

ties should thus be based on nonreligious jus-

tiﬁcations as speciﬁed. In the context of spatial

segregation, the state should accommodate re-

ligion as long as segregation is justiﬁed accord-

ing to secular (social) justiﬁcations. Such rec

ognition should also be accompanied by the

veriﬁcation that the social costs highlighted in

the objections speciﬁed do not impose too

heavy a burden on society. When the state acts

according to this principle, it does so out of a

secular respect for the needs of religious com-

munities or any other minority community. It

does not violate the Establishment Clause be-

cause it is motivated by secular and social con-

cerns rather than religious ones.

     

  

American law established antidiscrimination

duties through several antidiscrimination laws,

among them the Civil Rights Act of , the

Fair Housing Act of , and the Americans

with Disabilities Act of . These laws pro-

vide protection for race, color, religion, sex, and

national origin in the areas of voting, educa-

tion, employment, public accommodation,

and housing. In addition to federal legislation,

numerous state and local laws address discrim-

ination that is not covered by these laws (Hunt

). This set of rules challenges a minority

community that seeks to segregate spatially be-

cause it reinforces its commitment to equality,

even to those who are not members of the com-

munity or who do not share the conception of

good that it holds. Consider, for example, a sit-

uation in which a minority community seeks

to segregate spatially because of its unique cul-

tural characteristics. Antidiscrimination laws

require the community to refrain from discrim-

inating against those who are not members of

the community in regard to housing, employ-

ment, and education, but allowing such a pos-

sibility could thwart the purpose of segregation

in the ﬁrst place. In the case of Kiryas Joel, the

main motive for segregation was the reluctance

of members of the community to compromise

their religious worldview on gender segrega-

tion in schools and public spaces. Applying an-

tidiscrimination laws in the new town of Palm

Tree, therefore, would frustrate the entire pur-

pose of segregation. Spatial segregation in the

fourth generation thus poses a signiﬁcant chal-

lenge to the law because it is forced to examine

the boundaries of segregation as well as its im-

plications for the community, its members,

and those who are not members of the com-

munity.

As a result, the law in the fourth generation

of spatial segregation needs to take a protective

role. On the one hand, it should protect the

ability of minority communities to exercise

their right to spatial segregation, whether for

empowerment, pluralism, or utilitarian pur-

poses. On the other hand, it should protect in-

dividual members of the community, as well as

those who are not members of the community,

from the discriminatory consequences that this

separation may have. This tension sharpens

when the community that seeks to self-

segregate is a religious one. When it comes to

a religious minority community, the attempt to

compel it to comply with antidiscrimination

laws provokes an additional constitutional

challenge—the Free Exercise Clause, which

aims to limit the state’s actions to restrict

religion- related activities. Over the last few

years, the extent of exemption from antidis-

crimination laws granted for religious reasons

has expanded. Aer the Supreme Court’s ruling

in Oregon v. Smith, which held that judicially

mandated religious exemptions from generally

applicable legislation are normally inappropri-

ate, the Congress oﬀered a swi counterre-

sponse, enacting the Religious Freedom Resto-

ration Act of . This was followed by the

      

rsf: the russell sage foundation journal of the social sciences

15. 42 U.S.C. § 2000cc.

16. Burwell v. Hobby Lobby Stores, Inc., 573 U.S. ___ (2014).

17. Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, 584 U.S. ___ (2018).

Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Per-

sons Act of . These acts elevate the Free

Exercise Clause over antidiscrimination laws

and provide additional exemptions for reli-

gious reasons. Additional expansion of the

religion- based exemptions from antidiscrimi-

nation laws come in two recent Supreme Court

rulings: Burwell v. Hobby Lobby Stores



and Mas-

terpiece Cakeshop. v. Colo. Civil Rights Commis-

sion. It seems, therefore, that the Court’s ten-

dency is to extend the application of exemptions

by virtue of the Free Exercise Clause, meaning

that in more and more cases, individuals or

companies arguing that a regulation or a legis-

lation violates their religious faith may be ex-

empted from compliance (Luchenister ;

Sepper ). In other words, religious people

can use their beliefs to evade the application of

antidiscrimination laws. The legal tendency to

expand the scope of religious exemptions may

also be signiﬁcant in the fourth generation of

spatial segregation, especially as far as religious

communities are concerned.

In regard to the Free Exercise Clause, it can

also be argued that to determine the appropri-

ate role of the law, it is necessary to consider

the justiﬁcations for and objections to spatial

segregation in general, and in regard to minor-

ity communities in particular. However, this

question is diﬀerent from the one discussed

earlier, which focuses on state support or fund-

ing of such communities. This question relates

to the ability of the community to exclude oth-

ers or to discriminate against them by prevent-

ing them from purchasing housing within the

segregated town, or from employing them in

its institutions. Although such actions may

contribute to fulﬁlling the justiﬁcations for seg-

regation, they nevertheless pose threats to in-

dividual insiders, outsiders, and society as a

whole, thus requiring a strict examination of

their circumvention of the inherent objections

to segregation. In other words, although the

question of state funding should be examined

primarily for its contribution to the fulﬁllment

of the justiﬁcations, the question of the com-

munity’s exemption from antidiscrimination

laws should depend on its ability to answer the

objections described in regard to spatial sepa-

ration, especially those that impose costs on

outsiders.



The separation of Kiryas Joel from the town of

Monroe and the establishment of the new town

of Palm Tree as an exclusive ultra- Orthodox

town have spawned a new generation in the

American spatial segregation chronicle. This

generation is characterized by minority com-

munities that demand self- segregation from

their surroundings as part of their quest for

spatial justice. Although fourth- generation

claims might be justiﬁed for various reasons,

they are also objected to for various reasons.

This article outlines both the justiﬁcations and

objections to examine the role of the law in the

fourth generation of spatial segregation.

Voluntary segregation on behalf of minor-

ity communities requires the law to play a pro-

tective role, to protect the communities’ abil-

ity to exercise their aspiration to segregate

spatially, the individual members of the com-

munity, and those who are not members of the

community from the consequences that this

separation may have. A hard look at the justi-

ﬁcations for and objections to spatial segrega-

tion forces a rethink of how to address the le-

gal challenges facing spatial segregation,

which have fourth- generation characteristics.

The proliferation of minority communities

seeking to segregate spatially, as well as the

various challenges these actions pose, re-

quired the law to address the challenges and

to become a dominant player in the ﬁeld. In

this sense, the challenges that the fourth gen-

eration of American spatial segregation poses

allow the law to ensure that the renewed le-

gitimacy for spatial segregation will not re-

store the application of the “separate but

equal” doctrine, but instead serve as a basis

for separation only in those instances in which

separate, therefore equal is in play.

Table A1. Ultra-Orthodox Towns and Villages in New York and New Jersey

Municipal Status Population

Ultra-Orthodox

Population

Steps Taken

Toward Separation Major Friction Points

Palm Tree Kiryas Joel, N.Y. Tow n   October , incorporation

as a new town

Control over Board of Education,

territorial annexation

Lakewood, N.J. Township   — —

Mahwah, N.J. Township   — Calls to avoid selling apartments to

the ultra-Orthodox, struggle for

prevention of gender segregation in

the public sphere

Bloomingburg, N.Y. Village in town of

Mamakating

  — Territorial annexation, public

institutions

New Square, N.Y. Village in town of

Ramapo

  , incorporation as

a village

Struggles around planning laws and

building large houses suitable for

ultra-Orthodox families, legal

clashes over incorporation as a

village

Kaser, N.Y. Village in town of

Ramapo

  , incorporation as

a village

Incorporation as a village approved

without conﬂict

Spring Valley, N.Y. Village in towns of

Ramapo and

Clarkstown in

Rockland County

  Control over Board of Education,

territorial annexation

Ramapo, N.Y. To wn   Control over Board of Education,

ﬁnancing school transportation to

private schools, territorial

annexation

Source: Author’s tabulation from U.S. Census data.

Note: The data are taken from the 2018 census. Estimated population data for Bloomingburg, N.Y., are from “Population and Housing Unit Estimates.”

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Comparing Caste and Race: A Terrible Idea

Article

Jan 2025

Satanik Pal

Isabel Wilkerson's recent publication has sparked an academic debate regarding the true nature of social hierarchies in South Asia and the West. This article conducts a comparative historical sociology of caste in South Asia, and race in the US, to demonstrate structural differences between these two modes of social stratification. Although caste groups in South Asia had greater possibilities of social mobility and intermarriages, interracial sex and marriage were legally prevented between Whites and non-Whites in the United States. This was because most castes in South Asia were thought to have common origins in the Brahmin caste, whereas most races were thought to have emerged from different species. Furthermore, caste hierarchies often depended on the discretion and power of locally dominant castes, whereas racial hierarchies were legally established through pseudo-scientific theories and enforced in the United States through state authorities. These divergences in their respective trajectories of development and endurance present to us, a more comprehensive understanding of how caste and race were different in their respective configurations. This is also why sweeping generalizations on such forms of social stratification were discouraged by social scientists such as Cox and Ambedkar.

Navigating Post-COVID-19 Social–Spatial Inequity: Unravelling the Nexus between Community Conditions, Social Perception, and Spatial Differentiation

Article

Full-text available

Apr 2024

The 2023 SDGs report underscores the prolonged disruption of COVID-19 on community living spaces, infrastructure, education, and income equality, exacerbating social and spatial inequality. Against the backdrop of the dual impact of significant events and the emergence of digital technologies, a coherent research trajectory is essential for characterizing social–spatial equity and understanding its influential factors within the urban planning discipline. While prior research emphasized spatial dimensions and mitigated spatial differentiation to ensure urban equity, the complexity of these interconnections necessitates a more comprehensive approach. This study adopts a holistic perspective, focusing on the “social–spatial” dynamics, utilizing social perception (sentiment maps) and spatial differentiation (housing prices index) pre- and post-pandemic to elucidate the interconnected and interactive nature of uneven development at the urban scale. It employs a multi-dimensional methodological framework integrating morphology analysis of housing conditions, GIS analysis of urban amenities, sentiment semantic analysis of public opinion, and multiscale geographically weighted regression (MGWR) analysis of correlation influential factors. Using Suzhou, China, as a pilot study, this research demonstrates how these integrated methods complement each other, exploring how community conditions and resource distribution collectively bolster resilience, thereby maintaining social–spatial equity amidst pandemic disruptions. The findings reveal that uneven resource distribution exacerbates post-pandemic social stratification and spatial differentiation. The proximity of well-maintained ecological environments, such as parks or scenic landmarks, generally exhibits consistency and positive effects on “social–spatial” measurement. Simultaneously, various spatial elements influencing housing prices and social perception show geographic heterogeneity, particularly in areas farther from the central regions of Xiangcheng and Wujiang districts. This study uncovers a bilateral mechanism between social perception and spatial differentiation, aiming to delve into the interdependent relationship between social–spatial equity and built environmental factors. Furthermore, it aspires to provide meaningful references and recommendations for urban planning and regeneration policy formulation in the digital era to sustain social–spatial equity.

The The Pearl Effect: African American’s Continuous Push for Well-Being

Article

Aug 2021

Frank Jackson

Consider this question: If happiness is found in the pursuit of a goal, could it be that an oppressed group, that is eternally in a struggle for something better, could have a subconscious and profound relationship with well-being? Is it possible that the human spirit finds ways to survive and thrive with pride regardless of the oppression? The spirit is unique. It survives independently of the oppression with no goal to emulate. Flourishing in the black community is long under-identified and misunderstood. This is primarily due to the lens from which history has analyzed it. Due to the white lens through which we see and judge most things, inequality prevails in America, and propagates a negative message of trauma for African Americans; that they are an oppressed group and nothing more. Even joy is exaggerated and misplaced as an aid to white supremacy through the mistral stereotype, a happy slave grateful for his or her inferior position in society. As Mia Bay (unpublished) asserts, this creates a problematic dichotomy of where African Americans fit in with the flourishing discussion. This paper offers a different lens through which to define thriving in the black community under a new trait, the ‘pearl’ or essence of an oppressed community. Furthermore, it offers an original theory, ‘The Pearl Effect’, which is an original term that I have coined to describe the capacity of individuals or groups to create something positive or of beauty in the face of insurmountable odds and oppression. It is exemplified by the African American community embedding their essence into positive institutions as a resilient act in the face of continuous oppression. It provides examples of the institutions that throughout history personified the Effect and created opportunities for the black community to exhibit the ‘pearl’ trait and experience flourishing, specifically the Black Church, the Harlem Renaissance, and Hip Hop.

Segregation in America

Article

Jan 2024

Jabura Hosea

Structural racism and health in the age of COVID‐19: A selective review with policy implications

Article

Jan 2023

Structural racism encompasses the effects of racial bias across all systems of society. A growing body of data indicates that structural racism contributes to racial inequities in health across the lifespan. Investigators have documented associations of different dimensions of structural racism, including cultural and institutional discrimination, to health. To clarify and integrate the scope of these data, we examine a broad array of manifestations of both cultural and institutional racism and review their associations to specific health effects outcomes. We examine effects on COVID‐19 prevalence and mortality, but also investigate data on birth outcomes and premature mortality to gain insight into health effects at each end of the lifespan. Given the pervasive and well‐documented history of racism facing Black Americans, we focus this review on the effects of structural racism on the health of Black populations in the United States. To examine the association of cultural discrimination to health, we review studies of prejudicial communications assessed with measures of area‐level prejudice, leader communications of prejudice, and reactions to race‐related cultural events. To examine the association of institutional discrimination to health, we examine laws and institutional policies that discriminated against Black Americans and shaped social and physical environments characterized by residential racial segregation and disadvantage, occupational segregation, and restricted voting rights, among other manifestations of inequity. As we document, research has demonstrated associations of cultural racism to birth outcomes and mortality, data are lacking on direct relations to COVID‐19 mortality. Institutional discrimination has been consistently linked to the increased prevalence of and mortality from COVID‐19, and some aspects are associated with birth outcomes and mortality. Understanding the interrelations among cultural and institutional aspects of discrimination and their historical roots have important implications for the development of policies and interventions to reduce structural racism and mitigate its effects on health.

Introduction to the Issue

Article

Full-text available

Feb 2021

Racial Segregation in the Southern Schools, School Districts, and Counties Where Districts Have Seceded

Article

Full-text available

Jul 2019

The establishment of new school districts in predominantly White municipalities in the South is restructuring school and housing segregation in impacted countywide school systems. This article compares the contribution of school district boundaries to school and residential segregation in the Southern counties that experienced secession since 2000. Merging together several data sets, including Common Core of Data, census data, and shapefiles at multiple geographic scales, we measure segregation of public school students and the entire population over time. We show that school district secession is restructuring school segregation in the counties where secession is occurring, with segregation increasingly occurring because students attend different school districts. Additionally, in the most recent year of analysis, residents were increasingly stratified by race in different school districts. Segregation patterns differ substantially, however, depending on the history of secession in the county.

Addressing the housing needs of minority ethnic communities: Towards a pluralistic housing policy.

Chapter

Full-text available

Jan 2000

Richard Tomlins

The need for an ethnically sensitive housing policy has been highlighted by academic research which has documented the differential housing outcomes experienced between ethnic groups within national boundaries. A particular cause of concern has been the housing inequalities of minority ethnic communities, who are often concentrated in parts of urban areas which are neglected by the private market, and where other social welfare goods face pressure from high demand. State intervention is often the response to these 'problems', however it may take divergent forms. For example the advocacy of thew distribution of additional state resources from the political left, and the advocacy of social control from the political right. These approaches often appear to be paternalistic majority ethnic 'solutions' on behalf of, and for 'the other'. An alternative approach is offered by grassroots activism within minority ethnic communities. Demands for greater resources, but also significantly for more community control over resources, provide an important challenge to the future construction of social policy. They assert the primacy of empowerment and self help over paternalism, and question the validity of social engineering which may emanate from top down policy implementation.

From Jim Crow To Civil Rights: The Supreme Court And The Struggle For Racial Equality

Book

Oct 2023

Michael J . Klarman

Do Supreme Court decisions matter? In 1896 the United States Supreme Court ruled in Plessy v. Ferguson that railroad segregation laws were permissible under the Fourteenth Amendment. In 1954 the Court𠆘s decision in Brown v. the Board of Education held that the same constitutional provision invalidated statutes segregating public schools How great an impact did judicial rulings such as Plessy and Brown have? How much did such Court decisions influence the larger world of race relations? In From Jim Crow to Civil Rights, Michael J. Klarman examines the social and political impact of the Supreme Court’s decisions involving race relations from Plessy, the Progressive Era, and the Interwar Period to World Wars I and II, Brown and the Civil Rights Movement. He explores the wide variety of consequences that Brown may have had--raising the salience of race issues, educating opinion, mobilizing supporters, energizing opponents of racial change. He concludes that Brown was ultimately more important for mobilizing southern white opposition to racial change than for encouraging direct-action protest. The decision created concrete occasions for violent confrontation--court ordered school desegregation and radicalized southern politics, leading to the election of politicians who calculated that violent suppression of civil rights demonstrations would win votes. It was such violence—vividly captured on television—that ultimately transformed northern opinion on race, leading to the enactment of landmark civil rights legislation in the mid 1960s. A fascinating investigation of the Supreme Court’s rulings on race, From Jim Crow to Civil Rights, spells out in exhaustive detail the political and social context against which the Supreme Court Justices operate and the consequences of those decisions on the civil rights movement and beyond.

Race for Profit: How Banks and the Real Estate Industry Undermined Black HomeownershipHow Banks and the Real Estate Industry Undermined Black Homeownership

Book

Oct 2019

Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor

By the late 1960s and early 1970s, reeling from a wave of urban uprisings, politicians finally worked to end the practice of redlining. Reasoning that the turbulence could be calmed by turning Black city-dwellers into homeowners, they passed the Housing and Urban Development Act of 1968, and set about establishing policies to induce mortgage lenders and the real estate industry to treat Black homebuyers equally. The disaster that ensued revealed that racist exclusion had not been eradicated, but rather transmuted into a new phenomenon of predatory inclusion. Race for Profit uncovers how exploitative real estate practices continued well after housing discrimination was banned. The same racist structures and individuals remained intact after redlining’s end, and close relationships between regulators and the industry created incentives to ignore improprieties. Meanwhile, new policies meant to encourage low-income homeownership created new methods to exploit Black homeowners. The federal government guaranteed urban mortgages in an attempt to overcome resistance to lending to Black buyers – as if unprofitability, rather than racism, was the cause of housing segregation. Bankers, investors, and real estate agents took advantage of the perverse incentives, targeting the Black women most likely to fail to keep up their home payments and slip into foreclosure, multiplying their profits. As a result, by the end of the 1970s, the nation’s first programs to encourage Black homeownership ended with tens of thousands of foreclosures in Black communities across the country. The push to uplift Black homeownership had descended into a goldmine for realtors and mortgage lenders, and a ready-made cudgel for the champions of deregulation to wield against government intervention of any kind. Narrating the story of a sea-change in housing policy and its dire impact on African Americans, Race for Profit reveals how the urban core was transformed into a new frontier of cynical extraction.

Silent Covenants: Brown v. Board of Education and the Unfulfilled Hopes for Racial ReformBrown v. Board of Education and the Unfulfilled Hopes for Racial Reform

Book

Apr 2004

Derrick Bell

When the landmark Supreme Court case of Brown vs. Board of Education was handed down in 1954, many civil rights advocates believed that the decision, which declared public school segregation unconstitutional, would become the Holy Grail of racial justice. Fifty years later, despite its legal irrelevance and the racially separate and educationally ineffective state of public schooling for most black children, Brown is still viewed by many as the perfect precedent. Here, Derrick Bell shatters the shining image of this celebrated ruling. He notes that, despite the onerous burdens of segregation, many black schools functioned well and racial bigotry had not rendered blacks a damaged race. He maintains that, given what we now know about the pervasive nature of racism, the Court should have determined instead to rigorously enforce the "equal" component of the "separate but equal" standard. Racial policy, Bell maintains, is made through silent covenants--unspoken convergences of interest and involuntary sacrifices of rights--that ensure that policies conform to priorities set by policy-makers. Blacks and whites are the fortuitous winners or losers in these unspoken agreements. The experience with Brown, Bell urges, should teach us that meaningful progress in the quest for racial justice requires more than the assertion of harms. Strategies must recognize and utilize the interest-convergence factors that strongly influence racial policy decisions. In Silent Covenants, Bell condenses more than four decades of thought and action into a powerful and eye-opening book.

White Flight/Black Flight: The Dynamics of Racial Change in an American Neighborhood

Book

Apr 2011

Rachael A. Woldoff

Racial Formation in the United States

Chapter

Apr 2018

A Piece of the Pie: Blacks and White Immigrants since 1880

Article

May 1982
Hist Teach

Black Towns of Oklahoma

Article

Apr 1970

Arthur L. Tolson

Seeking Spatial Justice in Los Angeles

Chapter

Mar 2014

Edward W. Soja

A vital but often neglected part of the urban restructuring of Los Angeles has been a resurgent activism that has created some of the most innovative urban social movements in the country. The Justice Riots of 1992, as they are now called, stimulated vigorous grassroots and place-based coalitions of labor unions and community-based organizations seeking to deal with the enormous inequalities and injustices brought about by globalization and the formation of the New Economy. Affected to some degree by the critical spatial perspective espoused by the Los Angeles research cluster, these new coalitions were among the earliest in the United States to adopt specifically spatial strategies, and in these cases, thinking spatially about justice made a difference. This spatial turn in the justice movement is traced through three organizations: the Bus Riders Union and its initiating sponsor, the Labor/Community Strategy Center; the Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy (LAANE); and, most recently, the Right to the City Alliance.

“Separate, Therefore Equal”: American Spatial Segregation from Jim Crow to Kiryas Joel

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