The New York Times article “Dissent: Battered but Vibrant” by Benedict Carey looks into what makes a community the way it is by focusing on the Chicago neighborhood Chatham, and how it has dealt with changes that came about during the recent years, which included the recession and the shooting death of an off-duty police officer.
William Julius Wilson commented that if Chatham were to maintain its stability after the crisis, the concept of a neighborhood effect would be a great contribution in figuring out how to prevent people from leaving a neighborhood and strengthen neighborhoods that are at risk of falling into poverty. I definitely agree with this because it is always through tough times when you can see the strength of a unit, whether is a person, family, or neighborhood. If the people in the neighborhood have a strong sense of community and look out for each other then the neighborhood is much more likely to survive because people will be less likely to leave. If a lot of people move out of an area, it gives the impression that it is not a good neighborhood and people would be afraid to move there, which gives the neighborhood a greater chance at falling into poverty.
Contrary to what the social scientist predicted, Chatham did not remain stable throughout the recession. Local businesses were having a tough time, with one example given of Bull’s Eye Barber Shop whose revenues were down 40% in the first year. At the end of the article, it says that there are encouraging signs, one of which is that Bull’s Eye Barber Shop is busy again. Researchers believed that Chatham’s strong identity and block groups would help protect residents from larger economic problems. Given that Chatham didn’t really remain stable and had and down and up, I don’t think that those two factors really did anything, nor do I really understand how it would actually help protect residents from larger economic problems.
Something I found interesting was that Chatham has more that a hundred block groups. I didn’t know that neighborhoods actually did this; it just seems like something on television shows. Initially, I thought block groups were like neighborhood watch programs, looking out for dangerous people which I thought belonged more to not so good neighborhoods where more crimes might occur, so I didn’t think of that as an advantage for a neighborhood. However, the article describes the Chatham block groups as “citizen volunteers who monitor the tidiness of neighborhood lawns, garbage, and noise, as well as organize events.” When a block group is meant to keep a neighborhood nice and organize events, I can definitely see how it would be an advantage for a neighborhood.
Another thing that caught my eye at the end of the article was what Mrs. Worthmans said about how nothing changes unless people look after their children. I’ve never thought about that and like she said, I would blame other things like the city but children are the ones who would be staying in a neighborhood so it really is important to for people look after them is they want a neighborhood to remain nice. If the futures of a neighborhood don’t care what it is like, then it would just go down.
