HOMEOWNER
ASSOCIATIONS AND THE RISE OF RESIDENTIAL PRIVATE GOVERNMENT
New Haven: Yale University Press, 1994
cloth, 1996 paper. Order from publisher or Amazon.com
ISBN:
0-300-06638-4
Received 1995 "Best Book on Urban Politics Award" from American Political Science Association
"In the past two decades, without public notice or public debate, Americans have been establishing a new caste society, typified by private walled communities and by private governments within them that perform public functions. “Privatopia” is the best book ever written about such homeowner associations and the threat they pose to traditional notions of equal opportunity and fair play. Persuasively argued and beautifully written, it explodes the myth of the new Eden."
-Kenneth T. Jackson, Columbia University, Department of History, author of "“Crabgrass Frontier: The Suburbanization of the United States"
"McKenzie succeeds in persuading the reader that to understand local and even national politics, it is essential to understand how our notions of participation, community, and citizenship are being changed by the proliferation of CIDs as privatized, quasi- autonomous governments."
-Dennis Judd, University of Illinois at Chicago, Department of Political
Science, author of "The Politics of American Cities: Private Power and
Public Policy"
Suburban planned-unit developments of single family homes, urban condominiums, housing cooperatives, and other forms of common interest housing developments (CIDs) have become familiar sights in America. Currently there are about 150,000 of these developments, housing some 32 million people, or nearly one- eighth of the American population. Residents are required to belong to homeowner associations, pay monthly fees, and live under the rule of residential private governments. These governments perform functions for their residents that were once the province of local government, providing, for example, police protection, trash collection, and street maintenance and lighting. They also place restrictions on ownership of property and enforce rigid and often repressive codes of conduct governing the most private aspects of people's lives.
This book is the first comprehensive study of the political and social
issues posed by the rise of CIDs. Evan McKenzie shows how the developments can
diminish residents' sense of responsibility for the city as a whole by making
them reluctant to pay taxes for the same public services that their fees
provide. McKenzie also shows that the private governments of CIDs depart from
accepted notions of liberal democracy, promoting a unique and limited version
of citizenship that has serious implications for civil liberties. He argues
that the spread of CID housing has important consequences for politics at all
levels of government, because CID advocates now constitute a significant force
in interest group politics in many states, often organizing to demand tax breaks
or credits for CID residents. Tracing the history of CID housing from the
nineteenth century to the present, McKenzie highlights the important but
little-understood role public policy has played in advancing this large-scale
"privatization for the few," and he concludes by considering the
implications for urban politics.
Evan McKenzie is associate professor of political science at the University of
Illinois at Chicago. He has represented homeowner associations as an attorney
in California. He holds a J.D. from UCLA Law School and a Ph.D. in Political
Science from the University of Southern California.
Published by Yale University Press, P.O. Box 209040, New Haven, CT 06520-9040
to order from publisher by telephone, call: 1-800-YUP-READ
to order from publisher by internet, click here.
Evan McKenzie
Department of Political Science
University of Illinois at Chicago
1007 W. Harrison St.
Chicago, IL 60607
(312) 413-3782/ fax: 312-413-0440/ Internet: mckenzie@uic.edu