ABSTRACT
Robert D. Bullard’s Invisible Houston gives a brief history of race and politics in that Texas city, but the main focus is on the 1970s and 1980s. What Bullard does with Houston, Squires, Bennett, McCourt, and Nyden do with their treatment of the much academically studied city of Chicago. “Chicago needs to stimulate economic activity but it must be activity responsive to social needs, not just market signals”. Dianne M. Pinderhughes’s account of Chicago’s experience with race and ethnic politics takes us back in time—to the turn of the century—and compares blacks, Poles, and Italians. As a political scientist, she deals with the relevant literature on pluralism as she charts the political paths of these three groups. Bullard describes how the African-American communities—lacking sufficient political and economic clout—have been the disproportionate victims of waste-disposal facilities and discriminatory land-use decisions.
