Urban Emergency (Mis)Management and the Crisis of Neoliberalism

This volume places the Flint, Michigan, water contamination disaster in the context of a broader crisis created by neoliberal governance in the United States. Authors from a range of disciplines (including sociology, criminal justice, anthropology, history, communications, and jurisprudence) examine the failures in Flint, with an emphasis on comparison. Their analysis calls attention to similar trajectories for cities like Detroit and Pontiac, in Michigan, and Stockton, in California. While the studies collected here emphasize policy failures, class conflict, and racial oppression, they also attend to the resistance undertaken by Flint residents, Michiganders, and U.S. activists, as they fought for environmental and social justice.

Contributors include: Terressa A. Benz, Jon Carroll, Graham Cassano, Daniel J. Clark, Katrinell M. Davis, Michael Doan, David Fasenfest, A.E. Garrison, Peter J. Hammer, Ami Harbin, Shea Howell, Jacob Lederman, Raoul S. Lievanos, Benjamin J. Pauli, and Julie Sze.

Publication date: September 6, 2022

List of Figures and Tables
Notes on Contributors

Introduction: The Flint Sacrifice Zone
   Terressa A. Benz and Graham Cassano

PART 1
Structure in Context

1 Neoliberalism, Urban Policy and Environmental Degradation
   David Fasenfest

2 Colorblind Michigan
  The Legal Impossibility of Environmental Justice in Flint and Southwest Detroit
   Terressa A. Benz

3 Stockton Isn’t Flint, or Is It? Race and Space in Comparative Crisis Driven Urbanization
   Raoul S. Liévanos and Julie Sze

4 Too Close to Home
  The Incidence and Health Effects of Neighborhood Neglect in Flint, Michigan
   Katrinell M. Davis

5 Housing Waste
  The Lakeside Public Housing Complex, Pontiac, Michigan
   Graham Cassano, Jon Carroll and Daniel J. Clark

PART 2
Reaction and Resistance

6 Technocracy and Populism
  Remaking Urban Governance in Post-Democratic Flint
   Jacob Lederman

7 Waging Love from Detroit to Flint
   Michael Doan, Shea Howell and Ami Harbin

8 Bottling Public Thirst
  Scarcity, Abundance, and the Exploitation of “Need” in Mid-Michigan
   A.E. Garrison

9 Lead Does (Not) Discriminate
  Environmental Racism in Expert and Popular Discourse
   Benjamin J. Pauli

 Afterword: The Flint Water Crisis, KWA and Strategic-Structural Racism
  Written Testimony Submitted to the Michigan Civil Rights Commission Hearings on the Flint Water Crisis
   Peter J. Hammer

Index