Brandon M. Ward - Living Detroit: Environmental Activism in an Age of Urban Crisis (Routledge Equity, Justice and the Sustainable City series)

In Living Detroit, Brandon M. Ward argues that environmentalism in postwar Detroit responded to anxieties over the urban crisis, deindustrialization, and the fate of the city. Tying the diverse stories of environmental activism and politics together is the shared assumption environmental activism could improve their quality of life.

Detroit, Michigan, was once the capital of industrial prosperity and the beacon of the American Dream. It has since endured decades of deindustrialization, population loss, and physical decay in short, it has become the poster child for the urban crisis. This is not a place in which one would expect to discover a history of vibrant expressions of environmentalism; however, in the post-World War II era, while suburban, middle-class homeowners organized into a potent force to protect the natural settings of their communities, in the working-class industrial cities and in the inner city, Detroiters were equally driven by the impulse to conserve their neighborhoods and create a more livable city, pushing back against the forces of deindustrialization and urban crisis. Living Detroitjuxtaposes two vibrant and growing fields of American history which often talk past each other: environmentalism and the urban crisis. By putting the two subjects into conversation, we gain a richer understanding of the development of environmental activism and politics after World War II and its relationship to the crisis of Americas cities.

This book will be of great interest to students and scholars in environmental, urban, and labor history.

Brandon M. Wardis a Lecturer in History at Perimeter College, Georgia State University, USA.

Series editors: Julian Agyeman and Stephen Zavestoski

This series positions equity and justice as central elements of the transition toward sustainable cities. The series introduces critical perspectives and new approaches to the practice and theory of urban planning and policy that ask how the worlds cities can become greener while becoming more fair, equitable, and just.

The Routledge Equity Justice and the Sustainable Cityseries addresses sustainable city trends in the global North and South and investigates them for their potential to ensure a transition to urban sustainability that is equitable and just for all. These trends include municipal climate action plans; resource scarcity as tipping points into a vortex of urban dysfunction; inclusive urbanization; complete streets as a tool for realizing more livable cities; the use of information and analytics toward the creation of smart cities.

The series welcomes submissions for high-level cutting-edge research books that push thinking about sustainability, cities, justice, and equity in new directions by challenging current conceptualizations and developing new ones. The series offers theoretical, methodological, and empirical advances that can be used by professionals and as supplementary reading in courses in urban geography, urban sociology, urban policy, environment and sustainability, development studies, planning, and a wide range of academic disciplines.

Living Detroit
Environmental Activism in an Age of Urban Crisis
Brandon M. Ward

The Green City and Social Injustice
21 Tales from North America and Europe
Edited by Isabelle Anguelovski and James J. T. Connolly

For more information about this series, please visit www.routledge.com/Routledge-Equity-Justice-and-the-Sustainable-City-series/book-series/EJSCn

Environmental Activism in an Age of Urban Crisis

Brandon M.Ward

First published 2022
by Routledge
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2022 Brandon M. Ward

The right of Brandon M. Ward to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.

Parts of Chapter 6 appear in Brandon M.