The change of the century also brought along change in the Big Apple. Gotham, as Reitano refers to it, was accepting more immigrants than ever with 37.8% of the population foreign born. What was special about this new wave of immigration was that people were coming from all over the world. There were communities forming of people coming from the Carribean, East Asia, Central Asia, Latin America, and Eastern Europe. With Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, the 1990’s and early 2000’s consisted of turmoil regarding some of his civil and his education policies. But with the tragedy of 9/11, those seemed unimportant and Giuliani’s response to the attack over shadowed his harsh policies. It would take NY many years to recover from those unfortunate attacks.
One of the first groups of newcomers were the Russians. At the turn of the decade, Soviet Russia collapsed and many coming from Soviet ruled countries moved to America. Russian Jews came and settled in Brighton Beach, Brooklyn. They were welcome here because the area was already occupied by Eastern European Jews but there were still culture and language barriers to face. However, coming from cities with skills and education, these immigrants were able to accommodate themselves easier than typical newcomers. They were able to become entrepreneurs and assimilate into the new culture while also maintaining the one from back home.
Other groups such as the Asians weren’t able to assimilate so easily, instead they isolated themselves in their neighborhoods. The Chinese were excluded for a very long time due to the Chinese Exclusion Acts therefore neighborhoods such as Chinatown remained as hubs for the Cantonese speaking Chinese who moved in the 90s. These Chinese didn’t have much education and settled for cheap industrial labor often run by their Mandarin speaking countrymen who considered themselves more superior. By raising the rents, the Chinese of Chinatown were forced to move and start neighborhoods in Sunset Park, Brooklyn and Flushing, Queens. Other Asian groups also settled in Flushing, Queens such as the Koreans. Koreans came to America with education and success from their coutnries, but due to their language barrier they were forced to give up a lot and instead transferred their aspirations to their children. This idea that their children could get the education and resources necessary to become successful was known as the “model minority myth,” the Asian version of the American Dream. By 2009, Taiwanese born Chinese American City Coucilman, John C. Liu was elected as comptroller.
At this time there were also immigrants coming from places not so far from America such as the Latinos. Puerto Ricans and Dominican immigrants are able to travel back and forth from their countries making them transnational. However, these groups both faced serious problems when it came to facing low poverty and the lowest education levels in the country. But working together with people of the same language they were able to overlook national differences and work together to form alliances dedicated to helping out other Latinos.
The West Indians also learned to overcome national differences in order to band together as one community. The West Indian Day Carnival for example joins Trinidadians, Jamaicans, and even French speaking Haitians. One struggle that these groups of people faced was racism due to their skin color. Though they aren’t African American their dark skin color grouped them as one, and coming from countries where racism was never a problem it was a learning experience for most. But coming from English speaking countries and better education they were able to move into professional sectors of the city. Overall by 2010, NYC will have 51 minority city council members.
During this time period the Mayor was Rudolph Giuliani, and he changed the social contract of the city. Giuliani had little regards for the poor lower class and instead focused on the middle class. He tried to pass many drastic policies such as privatization of public services, defunding of welfare and Medicaid. He thought people should rely less on welfare and more on finding jobs therefore he started a new workfare program to help this situation. To those who didn’t find jobs he would place them in Work Experience Programs but this caused more harm then god. More and more people were losing the ability to continue school and poverty was increasing.
Giuliani also brought a lot of change in the education system. He tried to regularize public schools and did some good by laying the groundwork to get rid of the Board of Education and incorporating citywide testing in the system in order to raise education standrds. Meanwhile, he cut any school constructing budgets and trying to change the CUNY system with his counterpart Herman Badillo.
On the civil aspect, Giuliani tried many times to deny the First Amendment to the citizens of the city. He tried to shut down the Sensation exhibit in Brooklyn Museum because it was offensive to the Catholic community. He abused his powers as Mayor several times by letting the front of City Hall get used for events he approved of rather than ones that were important to the city such as HIV AIDs activist activity. But once the tragedy of 9/11 hit it was Giuliani who stepped up and became the hero of the city. He addressed the nation and brought back hope into the city in the midst of chaos. And although his previous years didn’t hold a kind track record his response to 9/11 made him more popular and lovable than ever. And for that is what he is remembered for.
