Focus Magazine
March/April (35/2)
ECONOMIC REPORT
Doing Good and Doing Well: Making the Business Case for Regional Equity and Racial Inclusion
by Manuel Pastor
In recent years, analysts and activists have begun to focus on regional
strategies as one way to address the issues of concentrated poverty and
racial exclusion that have long concerned African American urban communities. The
logic of the new proponents of “regional equity” has many nuances, but the general argument runs as follows: (1) the relative isolation of minority communities due
to suburbanization and the exodus of employment has contributed to economic
distress; (2) previous approaches focused on community development have made only
modest progress against the headwinds of white flight and biased federal policy; and
(3) any new strategy must seek to steer private investment back to urban areas,
connect residents to employment wherever it might exist in the metropolitan region,
and open up suburban communities to more minority and lower-income residents.
The regional equity perspective provides a new narrative and a new approach to
our urban problems, linking community development with larger economic and
policy dynamics. Partly because of this, it also allows for the creation of coalitions
of unusual allies, such as labor unions, churches, and minority communities—
groups that have often experienced historical divisions and tensions. And
perhaps the most unexpected of the constituencies to recently engage in regional
equity is one not often moved by pleas with regard to social and racial justice: business
leaders.
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