American Apartheid: Segregation and the Making of the Underclass

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"During the 1970s and 1980s a word disappeared from the American vocabulary," begins American Apartheid ". . . That word was segregation." But the practice of segregation certainly has not disappeared, as Douglas S. Massey and Nancy A. Denton glaringly expose. One-third of all American blacks live in one of just 16 urban areas, in neighborhoods so racially segregated they have almost no chance at interracial contact. The authors argue that segregation--and disassocation from not only other cultures, but other ways of life--is at the root of many problems facing African-Americans today.


Nathan Glazer, New Republic
In the meticulousness of its research and the density of its arguments, [American Apartheid] stands well apart from even the best-argued and most amply documented books by journalists on racial problems.


Andrew Billingsley, Washington Post Book World
A major contribution to our understanding of both racism and poverty. One hopes that the book will be read, not only by other scholars and policy analysts, but by a broad spectrum of citizens and by all the leaders of the nation.


Charles Murray, Times Literary Supplement
Richly documented. A splendid book. American Apartheid explores a topic that many of us have come to take for granted, presents a fascinating array of data that have never been assembled in one place and compellingly argues that segregation is crucial to understanding what has happened to American blacks.


Roberto M. Fernandez, Contemporary Sociology
Essential reading for anyone interested in the causes, and possible cures, of urban poverty.


The Annals of the American Academy Book Department, Roberta Ann Johnson
This is a remarkable book that speaks not only to liberals but to all Americans about a serious civil rights problem, residential segregation.


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This powerful and disturbing book clearly links persistent poverty among blacks in the United States to the unparalleled degree of deliberate segregation they experience in American cities. American Apartheid shows how the black ghetto was created by whites during the first half of the twentieth century in order to isolate growing urban black populations. It goes on to show that, despite the Fair Housing Act of 1968, segregation is perpetuated today through an interlocking set of individual actions, institutional practices, and governmental policies. In some urban areas the degree of black segregation is so intense and occurs in so many dimensions simultaneously that it amounts to "hypersegregation." The authors demonstrate that this systematic segregation of African Americans leads inexorably to the creation of underclass communities during periods of economic downturn. Under conditions of extreme segregation, any increase in the overall rate of black poverty yields a marked increase in the geographic concentration of indigence and the deterioration of social and economic conditions in black communities. As ghetto residents adapt to this increasingly harsh environment under a climate of racial isolation, they evolve attitudes, behaviors, and practices that further marginalize their neighborhoods and undermine their chances of success in mainstream American society. This book is a sober challenge to those who argue that race is of declining significance in the United States today.


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