Sink the Urban Archipelago

Ed Stephan, a sociologist guest-blogging at the Carpetbagger Report, suggests a political strategy for the Democratic Party: "It's the cities, stupid."

I think, instead, it's high time we identify with our Urban Base, in every state red or blue. We should aim to make ourselves the party of choice for every urban place in America.

(The emphasis is his.)

His argument, though, strikes me as so wrong, counterproductive, and destructive, that I hardly know where to begin.

Stephan's motivation is two-fold: (1) Census bureau data show that the "urban" population vastly outnumbers the "rural" population, by a current, and increasing, margin of nearly four to one; and (2) he claims "Urbanites are tolerant (even accepting) of many of the things Republicans brag about hating."

For the Cenus bureau, "urban" (i.e., non-rural) means only this: "An urban area generally consists of a large central place and adjacent densely settled census blocks that together have a total population of at least 2,500 for urban clusters, or at least 50,000 for urbanized areas." By that definition, no wonder "urbanites" are so dominant. A population of 2,500 is tiny village by the standards of the areas most people think about when the word urban is used.

A more useful division would be between true urban (the residents of city cores that Stephan appears to be referring to when he uses the word "urban"), suburban, exurban, and rural. I don't have numbers handy, but I strongly suspect that the size of the true urban crowd would not dominate that classification.

Stephan cites, and adopts the conclusions of, a widely-circulated article from immediately after the election last fall called The Urban Archipelago. He calls it "excellent," and "a brilliant analysis." When I first read it many months ago, though, I came to a very different conclusion. I found it ridiculously simplistic and full of insulting stereotypes. Here is a sample:

Citizens of the Urban Archipelago reject heartland "values" like xenophobia, sexism, racism, and homophobia, as well as the more intolerant strains of Christianity that have taken root in this country. And we are the real Americans. They--rural, red-state voters, the denizens of the exurbs--are not real Americans. They are rubes, fools, and hate-mongers.

There is much more along those lines:

The Republicans have the federal government--for now. But we've got Seattle, Portland, San Francisco, Chicago, Los Angeles, San Diego, New York City (Bloomberg is a Republican in name only), and every college town in the country. We're everywhere any sane person wants to be. Let them have the shitholes, the Oklahomas, Wyomings, and Alabamas. We'll take Manhattan.

And how about this gem?

To red-state voters, to the rural voters, residents of small, dying towns, and soulless sprawling exburbs, we say this: Fuck off.

That entire article is one big rant about a painful, lost election. It's essentially arguing for political warfare between big cities and everybody else. Thanks to the Republicans, we already have that, and Democrats, are on the losing side of that numbers game. And even if the facts were different and we were winning such a political civil war, the concept of pitting the dominant segment of the population against the rest should be repugnant to American values.

Unfortunately, Stephan has not just adopted the conclusions of the authors of The Urban Archipelago, he has adopted some of their divisive, stereotyping attitude as well, as he concludes with this:

The Democratic Party should focus on cities, leave the stagnating hillbillies to the GOP, and sigh "good riddance".

Even without the insults, this is simple bad political strategy. We already get huge majorities in many big cities, and smaller majorities in most of the rest. Yet that, along with the huge number of non-big-city Democratic voters like myself, is not quite enough to win control of the Federal government. If our plans for the country are superior, we should be able to convince enough extra suburban voters, exurban voters, rural voters, and brand new voters, to come to our side.

With the insults, forget it.

Comments

[jimmyk]

The Democratic Party should focus on cities, leave the stagnating hillbillies to the GOP, and sigh "good riddance".
Exactly the reason Democrats have such a hard time winning.

[Kevin Rosinbum]

Isn't it uncannily disheartening to finally hear, with the kind of zeal so many conservative authors, pundits and columnists have been using for years and years, the same polarizing and unyielding voice coming from liberal Democrats? I believe enough was finally enough, and this is quite literally a taste of conservatives own medicine. If the polarization is not stopped it will only make things worse. Liberals have listened to all sides for years; conservatives have not and this is the result. I suggest a new approach or else the words of Alan Paton may surely be realized, though in an entirely different context, of course.
"I have this great fear in my heart that one day when the white man turns to loving he will find we are turned to hating..."