Critical Synthesis Essay

Critical Synthesis Urban Sociology introduced students to five seminal texts from the field. While studying cities (and their surrounding areas), and their political, economic, and social institutions, it is important to understand the key themes covered in these books: contested space (both for the arenas of land development and redevelopments as well as for various geopolitical interests); residential segregation; poverty; inequality (and the roles that government agencies play in exacerbating and mitigating the negative effects of these conditions); and conflicts over natural resources. Each of these books elicit critical thought when examining cities; critical thinking in ways that consider not only the obvious, surface level impact of
Cities in the United States and abroad are radically stratified on the bases of race and income. This stratification results in an inequality of place that is reinforced by the growth machine system. Wealthy neighborhoods (disproportionally white) have the financial and influential means to demand exaction, and can often pick the growth projects best suited for their needs (but not always, and not completely; the growth machine is larger, and more powerful than any entity on the neighborhood level, negatively impacting all residents an some level). When wealthy communities are negatively impacted by growth projects, they are in the position to invest in their homes and communities to mitigate quality of life
In the book Jerusalem, Shlay and Rosen (2015) describe the spatial politics, urban growth, and importance of place in Jerusalem. The authors successfully describe a system in Jerusalem the mimics the growth machine apparatus of the United States described by Logan and Molotch, with an omnipresent, invisible hand, orchestrating development through shared