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Diversity of a Different Kind: Gentrification and Its Impact on Social Capital and Political Participation in Black Communities

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 June 2016

Benjamin J. Newman ,
Yamil Velez  and
Shanna Pearson-Merkowitz
Benjamin J. Newman*
Affiliation:
University of California Riverside
Yamil Velez
Affiliation:
Wesleyan University
Shanna Pearson-Merkowitz
Affiliation:
University of Rhode Island
*
Address correspondence and reprint requests to: Benjamin J. Newman, University of California Riverside, CA. E-mail: [email protected]
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Abstract

The literature examining the effect of residential integration on political behavior primarily focuses on how whites react to the entrance of non-whites into their communities. Over the past few decades however, the process of “white return” to urban centers throughout the nation has created the opportunity to invert the standard approach to studying racial context by exploring how minorities react to the entrance of whites into their communities. We adapt realistic conflict theories to the case of gentrification, and offer a model of the effect of white in-migration on social capital (SC) and political engagement in black communities. We demonstrate that white population growth erodes SC in black neighborhoods only where the larger surrounding community is majority black, and where such growth is accompanied by rising housing costs. Further, we find that residing in a gentrifying context, by eroding social capital, ultimately results in the political demobilization of black citizens.

Keywords

Gentrificationsocial capitalparticipationpolitical behavior
Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Race, Ethnicity, and Politics , Volume 1 , Issue 2 , September 2016 , pp. 316 - 347
Copyright
Copyright © The Race, Ethnicity, and Politics Section of the American Political Science Association 2016 

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