UvA-DARE (Digital Academic Repository) Diagnosing a City´s Social Diversity Jane Jacobs and The Wire’s Baltimore van Es, R.; van Rossum, J.S. Publication date 2018 Document Version Final published version Published in Jane Jacobs is still here License CC BY Link to publication Citation for published version (APA): van Es, R., & van Rossum, J. S. (2018). Diagnosing a City´s Social Diversity: Jane Jacobs and The Wire’s Baltimore. In R. Rocco (Ed.), Jane Jacobs is still here: Jane Jacobs 100 Her legacy and relevance in the 21st Century (pp. 200-207). TU Delft Press. https://books.bk.tudelft.nl/index.php/press/catalog/book/isbn.9789461869005 General rights It is not permitted to download or to forward/distribute the text or part of it without the consent of the author(s) and/or copyright holder(s), other than for strictly personal, individual use, unless the work is under an open content license (like Creative Commons). 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UvA-DARE is a service provided by the library of the University of Amsterdam (https://dare.uva.nl) Download date:01 Oct 2021 Diagnosing a City’s Social Diversity Jane Jacobs and The Wire’s Baltimore Dr. R. van Es* J.S. van Rossum Msc** * Organizational Philosophy Political Science, UvA [email protected] **Policy and Governance, Political Science, UvA [email protected] Abstract – Of Jane Jacobs’ four conditions for optimal diversity in the city, only the fourth deals with social diversity and it is exactly this condition that continues to spark criticism. To widen the perspective and obtain a comprehensive view of a city´s social diversity it would be helpful to use a broad diagnostic tool like the Organizational Discourse Analysis Model from organi- zational studies. This model is used to diagnose social diversity in the city of Baltimore as portrayed in the television series The Wire. The perspectives of Jacobs and critics are plotted in the Model, showing what other perspectives are relevant for diagnosing a city´s social diversity. Key words – Jane Jacobs, social diversity, The Wire, Organizational Discourse Analysis Model Introduction Discourse Analysis Model enriches of urban life. Jacobs views the Jacobs’ condition of a city´s social built environment through an According to Jane diversity. We will briefly discuss the anthropological lens (Wortham- Jacobs’ The Death and Life of conditions for diversity formulated Galvin, 2012) and includes in her Great American Cities (1961) by Jacobs and her critics. We will book everyday mini-narratives the concept of the city as an then describe the Organizational about real-life urban experiences organism required diversity. Jacobs Discourse Analysis Model and (Hirt, 2012). At the core of her distinguished several conditions explore multiperspectivism and how investigation is the question of for a city´s diversity, which became this influences the organizational how livable a city is. Where Le commonplace in the domains of analysis of a city. The model will then Corbusier sees standardization as urban planning and inner city be applied to the city of Baltimore the ideal and looks at a city as a architecture. Several social sciences as depicted in the HBO series The machine, Jacobs’ ideas about the disciplines, however, voiced criticism Wire. We will conclude by showing city are based on a concept of of Jacobs’ fourth condition that the angles on a city’s social diversity the city as an organism (Jacobs, addresses social diversity. To that are missing from Jacobs’ and 2009; Lengkeek, 2009). She sees gain a full understanding of the her critics’ analyses, but are revealed the city as an animate object or an concept of diversity, it is wise to by the diagnostic model. organism, with streets, parks and investigate it from different angles squares full of inhabitants, that and different disciplines (Hospers has an ability to revitalize itself et al., 2015). A multiperspectivist Jane Jacobs: The and is characterized by diversity. tool that would serve that purpose is Jacobs (1961) distinguishes four available. Developed in the field of Importance of a City’s conditions that are indispensable organizational studies, it is known for a city’s diversity: 1. A mix as the Organizational Discourse Diversity of primary functions: living, Analysis Model (ODAM). This tool working, recreation and culture; is helpful to analyze ´a body of Jane Jacobs is best known 2. A mix of old and new buildings citizens´ (polis) in the process of for her book The Death and Life that enable the mix of functions; organizing. This paper focuses on the of Great American Cities (Jacobs, 3. Blocks of mixed sizes, and lively question of how the Organizational 1961), an ethnographic description sidewalks; and 4. A sufficiently 201 dense concentration of people and a in a neighborhood. In fact, such between individuals, we also look at variety of people. A city must meet contrasts partly determine a city’s the differences between cultures and all four conditions to continue to charm (Page, 2011). Cities are subcultures when studying a city’s function and to be an economically complex places constructed around social diversity. Diversity in cultures viable and pleasant place to live. people (Hollis, 2013). and subcultures is about groups that The absence of any one of these Both criticisms primarily delineate and identify themselves conditions undermines the diversity address Jacobs’ fourth condition— in relation to other groups (Latour, of the city and will eventually diversity in numbers and types 2005). Group members expect a facilitate the city’s decline. of people. This paper will deal certain combination of attitudes exclusively with this fourth condition and behavior from each other. of ‘a variety of inhabitants’, which This combination is visible in we interpret to mean ‘a city’s social features like language, group size, Criticisms of Jacobs’ Views diversity’. In order to get a clear idea customs, rituals and symbols. of that type of diversity, we will first A combination of attitudes and on Diversity define a city’s social diversity and behavior is justified by a mix of then analyze it systematically. morals, ideology and religion. The One of Jacobs’ greatest concept of social diversity is directly critics is sociologist Herbert connected to concepts such as Gans. In City Planning and equality, democracy, solidarity Urban Realities (1962), he Social Diversity Individual Cultural and tolerance (Fainstein, 2010). argues that human behavior differences differences We acknowledge that this link is not so much dictated by the exists, but for the purposes of physical reality of the city— Observable Race/ethnicity, Language, this paper we focus solely on the streets and building—as it characteristics sex, age, body group size, social diversity as a research size, visible customs, is by the culture of the social disabilities, rituals, object (see Table 1). group to which the city dwellers class symbols belong. For example, in working Obviously, this human class culture, social life takes diversity is observable in an place outside the home, while Mindset Values, beliefs, Morality, urban setting as well. We define family life takes place inside elements attitudes, ideology, a city’s social diversity as the the home. That is why blue gender religion way in which a city organizes collar neighborhoods have such and reinforces these differences lively streets, even though the between people. We focus mostly principle of diversity might be on observable characteristics, largely absent as the inhabitants Table 1: Social diversity as a research object and deal with mindset elements often form a homogeneous wherever possible. group and the buildings are The field of not very varied either. When this A City´s Social Diversity as organizational studies provides type of neighborhood is close to a diagnostic model that takes downtown, it attracts artists and a Research Object a broad approach to texts and other bohemians. They too spend images, the differences between a lot of time outdoors, adding to Diversity is about differences, individuals and groups, and the the liveliness of the streets. Gans identities and categories. These ways in which they collaborate argues that middle class desires differences are also constructed in a effectively or ineffectively. This dominate urban planning and new city, as the production of difference model is the topic of the next two developments and that this social takes place in the social context sections. Section 4 introduces eight stratum does not prefer diversity (Hearn & Louvrier, 2015). metaphors and assigns them a place per se, as Jacobs does. According As there are many different in the organizational surface current to Gans, it is social, economic and lenses through which social diversity and undercurrent. Section 5 adds cultural factors that determine a is viewed, a classification by levels two metaphors that connect both city’s livability or unlivability for would be helpful. At surface level, currents and thus completes the that matter. To him, it is not the diversity refers to readily seen Organizational Discourse Analysis city and urban planning that is the attributes, such as race or ethnicity, Model. problem, nor the absence of diversity, sex, age, body size, visible disabilities but poverty and segregation. Unlike or class/socio-economic background. Eight Metaphors in the Jacobs, Gans addresses the issue at Studies at this level focus on a national rather than a local level similarities and differences in those Surface Current and the (L’Heureux, 2012).