Urban Fortunes: The Political Economy of Place

by John R. Logan, Harvey Molotch

This sociological classic is updated with a new preface by the authors looking at developments in the study of urban planning during the twenty-year life of this influential work.

Genres: Sociology, Urbanism, Nonfiction, Cities, Urban Studies, Urban Planning, Urban

383 pages, Paperback

First published February 1, 1987

Reviews

[Nils · Rating 4 out of 5]

A classic of urban sociology, using a deceptively simple framework for assessing urban development, by asking who controls the "exchange value" of a given urban site, and how their power lines up against the stakeholders of the (current) "use value" of the urban locale. Ironically, there appears to be a deep conservatism at the root of the book -- that is, a bias in favor of urban incumbents, over those who would change the urban fabric to make way for new kinds of uses. Certainly many of the latter or often motivated by little more than venality, and often their would-be clients are not a particularly pleasant lot (bourgies); but this hardly means that we should romanticize the "daily round" of the urban incumbents. Even seen from the point of view of the urban poor, achieving historical social justice may be easier through mobility to new locales than through attempts to force incumbent urban power structures to be more fair by holding developers hostage. Often the only choice facing the urban poor is continued poverty and social exclusion in their current site, on the one hand, versus "displacement" on the other. The fact that many of the urban poor move out of their incumbent neighborhoods as soon as they have the money to do so and social barriers to mobility (e.g. segregation, formal or otherwise) are removed, is a good sign that these are neighborhoods that do not necessarily warrant defense in their current mode. In short, just because developers act as urban vandals doesn't mean that the thing that they are vandalizing is necessarily all that nice. That has to be assessed on a case by case basis.

[Tyler Munn]

With a subtitle like "the political economy of place", I was definitely expecting a standard Marxist urban theory treatise. I definitely did not get that which is mostly for bad but for good to some extent. Logan and Molotch reject the economic determinism of Marxist urban theory and instead use concepts that you get from page one of capital like use value and exchange value. I appreciated that they divided deeper than most Marxists would into the human agency in these processes. However, I think they are far to optimistic about working within the system to stop a fundamental problem of capitalism, its growth tendency. They rightfully name this and describe it, but ultimately attribute it to a coalition of rentiers and capitalists who create growth coalitions. Reading this book almost 40 years later is quite sad because they had hope in their reformist propositions that never came about. In my view, this is due to the fundamental laws of capital accumulation. In their view, I suppose we have just yet to prove to people that growth isn't good.

[Elizabeth · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was all right. I felt like it was trying to put a guilt trip on rich people the whole time. Not that I should have felt guilty because I'm not rich but rather aspire to be.

[Denny Troncoso · Rating 4 out of 5]

A well researched book on real estate cities and everything related to it. It discussed politics, labor, capital investments and more. It was written in the 1980s but many points are timeless. Good for real estate entrepreneurs who enjoy learning everything you can about real estate. Also great for researchers and sociologists.

[Emma · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was the theoretical framework for my master's thesis

[Emily Katherine · Rating 4 out of 5]

So like… I understand 80% of this, the other 20% is just… I dunno I’ll get it at some point

[David Moss · Rating 4 out of 5]

Other than the extremely erudite sociologist-speak getting in the way of enjoying a fresh perspective on land development, the saddest thing was the conclusion: city government (whom he spent a portion of the book explaining are held hostage by the growth machine) should get tough on capital and rentiers. No examples, really, of this working beyond an anecdote or two... So it was good for a different perspective, but not useful for the purposes of improving city life.

[Pat Falkner · Rating 2 out of 5]

not what I expected, kind of Marxist, but in a good way. Helped me understand the way city governments are organized to try to create growth opportunities for the local business leadership group.

[Robert Poole · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting read describing growth coalitions and their impact on society. The authors argue use value over rent value of place.