Synopses & Reviews
This book offers important lessons for all cities! Social Justice and Local Development Policy tells the inside story of the Chicago Development Plan, the late Mayor Harold Washington's policy of social, justice-based local economic development. Norman Krumholz, former president of the American Planning Association, described the 1984 Chicago Development Plan as . . . the most aggressive model thus far . . . for running a city for the benefit of its people. Its vision was driven by the notion that questions of economic equity, that is, who gets what kind of jobs and the resultant income, were inextricably bound to the practice of public urban economic development planning. As the chief architect and manager of Chicago's development agenda, Robert Mier is the authoritative source on how to design and implement such a plan for both growth and fairness. Social Justice and Local Development Policy is essential reading for planners, public officials, scholars and students of urban economic development. The book fills a definite need and I would adopt it for my graduate class in 'Economic Development Policy.' There is not a book currently available dealing strictly with neighborhood economic development. I would envision a reasonable number of adoptions in planning programs as well as a number of sociology courses in community development. --Richard D. Bingham, Cleveland State University Just the book we need. It has an important focus because the Chicago experience is renowned as the most interesting local economic development effort in recent years. . . . The clear strength of the book is its breadth on the variety of topics necessary to fully explore the field. . . . We need a booklike it to teach local economic development. Also it is a very important story and needs to be documented and available to researchers in the future. --Allan David Heskin, University of California, Los Angeles Robert Mier, through his research and his experience, is, at present, the most influential scholar in this area. He was at the center of the most ambitious and, arguably, most successful experiment in developing an equity-based approach to local development. . . . He is not only an articulate and respected critic of urban economic development policy, he is also one of the nation's foremost practitioner's on equity planning. . . . This text will be read by students, researchers and practitioners. The student market of the book should be both broad and deep. . . . As a book with a great deal of 'primary' case material to impart, the book should also serve advanced researchers and planning and policy professionals interested in day-to-day problems of management and implementation. --David Perry, State University of New York at Buffalo Robert Mier provides considerable insight into the role of planners and local government officials seeking greater social justice. . . . Perhaps Mier's greatest contribution is his presentation of a model of cooperative leadership for community problem solving. . . . Mier's book should be read. --American Planning Association Journal All in all, Social Justice and Local Economic Development Policy is a fine introduction to, and analysis of, a set of planning events with implications for planning practice further ahead. Planners can learn a lot from Robert Mier's reflections. --Canadian Journal of Urban Research
Synopsis
The inside story of the Chicago Development Plan has been described as the most aggressive model thus far... for running a city for the benefit of its people'. In this book, Robert Mier, the chief architect and manager of Chicago's development agenda, makes a valuable contribution to the debate on local approaches to economic regeneration proving that the Chicago experience provides important lessons for all cities.