ABSTRACT
This chapter demonstrates that federal urban legislation has played an important role in either facilitating or obstructing citizen participation in politics. It provides an assessment of the participatory strategies for the practice of democracy in urban America. By all credible estimates, the decade of the 1960s marks the modern foundation of urban citizen participation in politics. Convinced that federal action was necessary to eliminate poverty and other social ills, President Lyndon B. Johnson called for a War on Poverty. Political scientists have noted increases in voter participation among urban residents since the enactment of the Motor Voter Bill. Many urban areas have witnessed the unabated increase of enclave communities, where affluent urban residents isolate themselves behind walls and other architectural structures that are guarded by private security patrols. An important aspect of the trickle-down theory was its vigorous efforts at deregulation and the concomitant absence of citizen participation in urban policy-making decisions.
