ABSTRACT
The warning issued by the Kerner Commission in 1968—“Our nation is moving toward two societies, one black, one white—separate and unequal”—has its territorial counterpart in the racial divisions within our urban areas. With blacks concentrated in the central cities, surrounded by overwhelmingly white suburbs, the turf held by each of the two societies seems all too clear. That these two territories offer their respective residents a very unequal set of resources also seems clear. As a result, many students of urban affairs have argued that where black people live is not merely an accidental outcome of the way the housing market operates, but has become in itself a way of reinforcing the disadvantages blacks face in American society. If this view is accurate, opening the suburbs to the black poor should be a prime aim of public policy, not only because freedom of movement is a fundamental right in itself, but also because it is an important way of reducing racial inequalities. Presumably the key to a suburban house will also unlock a wide range of opportunities that are now closed to black people.
