Joel Kotkin, an author and director of a think tank centered on urbanism, says that suburbs are where the action is. Suburbs offer community cohesion, and people are more invested in property in politics there than residents of city cores.
As CityLab reports, Kotkin and his Center for Opportunity Urbanism published a report called “Restoring Localism,” which identifies the trend toward hyper-centralization in terms of federal and state policies on poverty and education.
“‘Hyper-centralization’ assumes the superior expertise and wisdom of bureaucracies with the power to regulate,” he writes. “It is tied to the nationalization of politics, an approach that ignores local conditions and rationalizes single solutions for a highly diverse country.” Kotkin wants the country needs to “return” to what he terms “localism,” a governance structure that’s rooted in cohesive groups of people, as opposed to a centralized city, state, and (especially) federal government.
CityLab spoke with Kotkin about localism and homeownership.
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