Neoliberal Urban Revitalization in Chicago

Over the last two decades, Chicago's strategy to revitalize areas of economic decline and concentrated poverty centered on two federal housing programs: Housing Opportunities for People Everywhere (HOPE VI) and its latter incarnation, Choice Neighborhoods. This paper examines the ideological turn from Keynesian New Deal policies to neoliberal revitalization programs and explores the programs' strategies to transform low-income, minority residents into "self-sufficient" market actors who benefit from a revitalized neighborhood's improved amenities. Finally, the paper argues that both policies will not mitigate concentrated poverty, as their neoliberal approach is nominally redistributive. With its ability to intervene in the market and economic processes, government intervention is better positioned to address the economic and racial inequalities that produced such poverty in the first place.