Neighborhood Democracy: The Hidden Layer of Federalism

• In Event: Political Economy and Local Democracy

Abstract

15 city councilors govern Los Angeles, CA, a city of nearly 4 million residents. In 1930, when the size of the city council was increased to its current number of seats, the population was half the size and each city councilor represented 125,000 residents, rather than the quarter of a million they do today. Across the United States, the 20th century has seen this pattern repeated: the structure of institutions has not responded to population growth and increasing racial and ethnic diversity of cities.

The interests of neighborhoods—a geographic area with distinctive community, aesthetics, functions, and geographic space—have always been central to political representation in city government. At the turn of the 20th century, neighborhood representation through ward bosses of party machines facilitated both corruption and immigrant mobility. But in reaction to machine politics, reformers pushed for drastic changes in the structure of city governments: in 1903, the median large city had 20 council seats by 1934, the median city had only 9. In addition to reducing the size of the council, cities also switched from electing councilors by districts to an at-large system where each council is elected by cities as a whole.

These changes removed the link between individual neighborhoods and city hall. This link serves both politicians and neighborhoods who represent them. Without this link, planners knocked down large swaths of neighborhoods to built highways, stadiums, and civic monuments; civil society groups were able to mobilize to stop these actions in some neighborhoods, but less frequently among marginalized communities with fewer resources. On the other side of the coin, politicians lost a direct connection with their constituents and were at the risk of appearing out of step with public opinion.

What emerged in response to these dual problems are a new set of institutions: neighborhood groups institutionalized by city government. Today, nearly a quarter of the 100 largest cities in the United States have some form of neighborhood governance. While many of these groups have roots in civil society, they are distinguished by the formal advisory powers, budgets, and staff given to them by the city. Sitting between the public and organized interests and the familiar offices of the mayor, city council, and appointed commissions, this institution serves as a missing link in the American federal system.

I document the prevalence of neighborhood governance institutions, explain their formation, and assess whether they improve responsiveness and governance in cities. First, using new archival materials, I will trace the history of neighborhood representation in the 20th and 21st centuries, focusing on three critical junctures: 1) the reform movements that sought to shrink legislatures and insulate the bureaucracy from popular control (1880-1930), 2) the demographic transition of the Great Migration and white flight concurrent with federal anti-poverty programs that required maximum feasible participation of neighborhoods in distributing funds (1945-1968), and 3) the current political cleavage over the housing shortage, gentrification and displacement, and minority representation in cities. In each of these eras, I will examine the different political issues that necessitate neighborhood representation and the degree to which city institutions or civil society serve this role. In assessing this tradeoff between formalized and association institutions, I will focus on two eras when neighborhood institutions are brought into city government: in the 1970s when the participatory programs mandated by anti-poverty no longer had a distributive role and in the 1990s and 2000s as battles over neighborhood control of land use policy heighted geographic inequality within cities.

To assess the responsiveness of these institutions, I examine all communications, formal endorsements of legislation, and advisory votes on land use developments. If neighborhood representative institutions are driving policy outcomes, we would expect their positions to be reflected in policy outcomes. Furthermore, if they are solving information problems for elected representatives, we would expect the city councilor representing a specific neighborhood to vote more closely with the recommendations of neighborhood councils. I have identified data sources in two cities, New York, NY and Los Angeles, CA, and will issue public records requests for the remaining cities in my sample. This large-n analysis and statistical test of representation will help validate the original theory of why these neighborhood level institutions form and what purpose they serve.

Author

• Alexander Laurence Sahn, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill