Regime Politics: Governing Atlanta, 1946-1988

by Clarence N. Stone

From the end of Georgia's white primary in 1946 to the present, Atlanta has been a community of growing black electoral strength and stable white economic power. Yet the ballot box and investment money never became opposing weapons in a battle for domination. Instead, Atlanta experienced the emergence and evolution of a biracial coalition. Although beset by changing conditions and significant cost pressures, this coalition has remained intact. At critical junctures forces of cooperation overcame antagonisms of race and ideology.

While retaining a critical distance from rational choice theory, author Clarence Stone finds the problem of collective action to be centrally important. The urban condition in America is one of weak and diffuse authority, and this situation favors any group that can act cohesively and control a substantial body of resources. Those endowed with a capacity to promote cooperation can attract allies and overcome oppositional forces.

On the negative side of the political ledger, Atlanta's style of civic cooperation is achieved at a cost. Despite an ambitious program of physical redevelopment, the city is second only to Newark, New Jersey, in the poverty rate. Social problems, conflict of interest issues, and inattention to the production potential of a large lower class bespeak a regime unable to address a wide range of human needs. No simple matter of elite domination, it is a matter of governing arrangements built out of selective incentives and inside deal-making; such arrangements can serve only limited purposes. The capacity of urban regimes to bring about elaborate forms of physical redevelopment should not blind us to their incapacity to address deeply rooted social problems.

Stone takes the historical approach seriously. The flow of events enables us to see how some groups deploy their resource advantages to fashion governing arrangements to their liking. But no one enjoys a completely free hand; some arrangements are more workable than others. Stone's theory-minded analysis of key events enables us to ask why and what else might be done. Regime Politics offers readers a political history of postwar Atlanta and an elegant, innovative, and incisive conceptual framework destined to influence the way urban politics is studied.

Genres: Politics, History, Nonfiction, Cities

328 pages, Paperback

First published October 1, 1989

Reviews

[Frank Stein · Rating 2 out of 5]

Almost as disappointing as "Who Governs." This is supposed to be another contemporary classic in urban political science, yet the majority of the book is spent name-dropping other writers, "weighing" their theories without providing any of their evidence, and then coming up with some airy-fairy phrases on "regimes" and "governing coalitions" and "the social production of power," as if phrases were theories and facts were an annoyance. Its overaching hypothesis, that urban politics is dominated by a "regime" that is formed by a governing coalition of often antagonistic interests, is at once both common-sensical and impossible to prove. This perhaps explains its appeal to post-modern poli-sci nerds.

At least, unlike "Who Governs," it tries to give a real history of the city. I didn't know that Atlanta mirrored DC's "Advisory Neighborhood Councils" and New York's "Community Boards" with its own "Neighborhood Planning Units," and that each city formed these circa 1973. Also, who knew that former Carter ambassador to the UN and Atlanta mayor Andrew Young dressed up as a panhandler to discover what it felt like.

[James · Rating 4 out of 5]

Stone argued that in Atlanta, governing coalitions of informal alliances between the white business elite (who controlled the economy) and the black middle class (who controlled city hall, eventually developed through the post war changes of Atlanta becoming a majority black city. Atlanta had a reputation of being softer of segregation and gradually eliminated formal segregation faster than other Southern cities, pushed by white business elites. When by the early 1970s, Atlanta had become majority black and black mayors began to be elected, the white business elite and neighborhood movement that brought the new mayors to power clashed at first, as they did not have relationships and had different agendas. Eventually, the “development” agenda of white business elites and black middle class combined to push through private plans.

Key Themes and Concepts
-Urban regime is the informal alliances of governing, both within formal power structures and informal.
-Electoral majority does not equal governing coalition. Poor and working class blacks are electoral majority but not part of governing coalition as the “neighborhood movement” has largely been shut out of governing.
-Business elites had access to resources that could be used to get development projects done faster if city hall cooperated.
-Structure of power means that urban political power is limited but private economic power is the real makers of policy.

[Opossum · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting book and definitely presents a lot of interesting ideas, but I’m still not quite sure what I think of it yet. I may appreciate it more as time goes on, but the title is very appropriate.

[Laura · Rating 3 out of 5]

A excellent study of the relationship between business and the political structure of Atlanta 1946-1988. The political theory gets a little dense at times, but Stone's conclusion are interesting, well-reasoned and well-documented.