City Trenches: Urban Politics and the Patterning of Class in the United States

by Ira Katznelson

In City Trenches, Ira Katznelson looks at an important phenomenon of the sixties—the resurgence of community activism—and explains its sources, challenges, and failure. Katznelson argues that the American working class perceives workplace politics and community politics as separate and distinct spheres, a perception that defeats attempts to address grievances or raise demands that break the rules of local politics or of bread-and-butter unionism. He supports his thesis with an absorbing case study of Washington Heights-Inwood, a multiethnic working-class community in Manhattan.

Genres: Cities, Urban Studies, Politics

267 pages, Paperback

First published September 12, 1981

Reviews

[Jerrod · Rating 5 out of 5]

dense but very helpful analysis of the unique American historical conditions that continue to structure political activity of the working class, particularly a class politick that sees work and community as wholly distinct and meaningfully separate sites of struggle