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Urban Theory
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Using the theory of Peter Marcuse on partitioning in urban areas discusses the city ...... More...
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Paper Abstract:
Using the theory of Peter Marcuse on partitioning in urban areas, discusses the city of San Diego.

Paper Introduction:
Urban Theory San Diego as the Partitioned CityIntroduction Peter Marcuse in an essay titled The Partitioned City inHistory makes the case that throughout history cities have beenspatially divided into distinct residential and working enclaves based uponthree specific lines that can be categorized as divisions by culture byfunctional role and by position in the hierarchy of power Marcuse states that many of these lines but not all are social divisionsbrought about by the conscious acts of their residents and those who holdpower or

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This listing represents the transformation of society fromits agrarian origins to its post-Fordist globalized economic basis. Among cultural divisions, religion andethnicity are seen as predominant whereas among functional divisions,economic issues seem to have varied in terms of their impact over time. 2 9a. In considering the viability of Marcuse's theory, it is important torecognize as does Betty Smith (2 6, 119) that San Diego has become adivided city in which lifestyles are wide ranging and there are significantdisparities between different ethnic and cultural groups. farm managers) |54,414 |1 % ||Business & financial |28,587 |5% ||Computer & mathematical |21,947 |4% ||Architecture & engineering |19, 35 |3% ||Life, physical & social science |13,556 |2% ||Community & social service |8,242 |1% ||Legal |9,7 4 |2% ||Education, training & library |33,114 |6% ||Art, entertainment, sports & media |15,749 |3% ||Healthcare practitioners |26,244 |5% ||Service |87,593 |16% ||Healthcare support |8,765 |2% ||Protective service |8,453 |2% ||Food preparation & serving |31,199 |6% ||Building & grounds cleaning/maintenance |2 ,284 |4% ||Personal care & service |18,892 |3% ||Sales & office |146,898 |27% ||Farming, fishing & forestry |1,357 | % ||Construction, extraction & maintenance |36,973 |7% ||Production, transport & material moving |49,963 |9% | Source (City of San Diego, 2 9b, 1) Table 2 Household IncomeHousehold Income (1999) (Households) (P52)|MEDIAN HOUSEHOLD INCOME |$45,826 | || |TOTAL |PERCENT ||Total households |45 ,691 |1 % ||Less than $1 , |37,64 |8% ||$1 , -$19,999 |52,379 |12% ||$2 , -$29,999 |55,521 |12% ||$3 , -$39,999 |52,476 |12% ||$4 , -$49,999 |44,819 |1 % ||$5 , -$59,999 |38,64 |9% ||$6 , -$74,999 |48,285 |11% ||$75, -$99,999 |5 ,436 |11% ||$1 , -$149, |43,459 |1 % ||$15 , or more |27, 36 |6% | Table 3 Earnings & Income (1999) (Households) (P58-P75)| |TOTAL |PERCENT ||Total households |45 ,691 |1 % ||With wage/salary income |36 , 11 |8 % ||With earnings |376,299 |83% ||With Supplemental Security income |21,781 |5% ||With other types of income |59,281 |13% ||With retirement income |72,638 |16% ||With public assistance income |17,816 |4% ||With Social Security income |9 ,875 |2 % ||With interest, dividend or rental income |171,976 |38% ||With self-employment income |6 , 31 |13% |Source (City of San Diego, 2 9b, 2) Table 4Housing in San Diego (Census 2 )Housing Units by Type (H31)| |TOTAL |PERCENT |OCCUPIED |PERCENT |PERSONS PER || | | | |VACANT |HOUSEHOLD || | | | | | ||Total housing |469,68|1 % |45 ,691 |4% |2.61 ||units |9 | | | | || | | | | | ||Single family |264,93|56% |256,721 |3% |2.93 || |3 | | | | ||Single family |219,2 |47% |213, 11 |3% |2.99 ||(1 unit, |7 | | | | ||detached) | | | | | ||Single family |45,726|1 % |43,71 |4% |2.61 ||(1 unit, | | | | | ||attached) | | | | | ||Multiple |198,34|42% |187,97 |5% |2.19 ||family |2 | | | | ||2 to 4 units |41,957|9% |4 , 23 |5% |2.32 ||5 to 9 units |47,3 4|1 % |45,339 |4% |2.33 ||1 units or |1 9, 8|23% |1 2,6 8 |6% |2.65 ||more |1 | | | | ||Mobile home |5,858 |1% |5,5 3 |6% |2.65 ||Other |556 | % |497 |11% |1.6 |Source (City of San Diego, 2 9c, 1) Table 5Land Use in San DiegoData as of 2 is an approximation of land use acreage totals.|Total City Acreage |219, acres || | ||GENERAL LAND USE: |DEVELOPED ACRES: || | ||Low Density Single Family |272 acres ||Single Family |37, 5 acres ||Multiple Family |1 ,22 acres ||Mobile Homes |1, 65 acres ||Commercial |12,2 acres ||Industrial |11,17 acres ||Office |1,765 acres ||Schools |5,137 acres ||Parks |62,31 acres ||Agriculture |9,87 acres ||Roads/Freeways |3 ,6 acres |Source (City of San Diego, 2 9d, 1) Extrapolating from the theory of Marcuse (2 2, 17), one wouldassume that the post-Fordist city would have relatively little land devotedto industrial or agricultural use and more land dedicated to a combinationof commercial and office use along with extensive tracts of land for singlefamily housing. VanKempen, 11-34. Metropolitan San Diego: How geography and lifestyle shape a new urban environment. The Port Authority is another important player in redevelopmentefforts which have been characterized as succeeding in establishing arevitalized and dynamic urban center in which upscale residences andrecreational opportunities abound ("Downtown San Diego," 2 4, A21). In San Diego aselsewhere, urban renewal has led to the gentrification of the central city,the movement of industrial jobs outside of the city center, and themarginalization and isolation of ethnic and other minorities (Chapin, 2 2,57 ). Journal of Cultural Geography, 25: 223-244.Downtown San Diego: An urban example for the 21st century. Bosco. Accessed online September 29, 2 9.City of San Diego. 2 2. http:// www.sandiego.gov/planning/programs/mapsua/housing.shtml. Peter Marcuse and R. While the San Diego region is not on theaverage particularly wealthy, it is what Bislev (2 4, 6 6) calls apolarized city where rapid growth has created significant socialdifferences between a growing Mexican population and a majority Caucasianpopulation. The juxtaposition of public housing with moreexpensive urban homes is characteristics not only of San Diego but of otherpartitioned post-Fordist cities in the United States.Conclusions about the Theory and San Diego The theory articulated by Marcuse (2 2, 12-13) is an excellent lensthrough which the city of San Diego can be viewed. Crotty and Bosco(2 8, 224) note that polarization of Mexican migrant workers, African-Americans, and Mexican-Americans in the lower socioeconomic brackets hascreated a city that is physically partitioned along ethnic as well asincome lines. Home ownership at the county level isrepresented by 55.4 percent of the citizenry and the median householdincome for 2 7 was $61,724 (US Census Bureau, 2 9, 1). Included in the Appendices is Table 5, depicting land use in SanDiego. Economic development. Appendices Figure A Ethnic Division in San Diego[pic]Source (City of San Diego, 2 9a, 1) Table 1 OccupationOccupation (Employed civilian population age 16 and older) (P5 )| |TOTAL |PERCENT ||Total employed civilians age 16+ |553,376 |1 % ||Management, professional & related |23 ,592 |42% ||Management (incl. Educationally, while 82.6percent of county residents have a high school degree, only 29.5 percenthave a Bachelor's degree or higher. Journal of Cultural Geography, 24: 119-12 .US Census Bureau. Of the 469,689 total housing units,264,933 or 56 percent are single family units, the majority of which aredetached. This is a quasi-public downtownredevelopment arm in which the city plays a major role in determining landuse. Accessed online September 29, 2 9. http:// www.sandiego.gov/planning/programs/maspua/landuse.shtml. The partitioned city in history. Applying the theory ofpartitioning and the role of the state as well as various social, economic,political, and ideological characteristics to the case of San Diego,California offers a unique opportunity to explore the viability of thetheory developed by Marcuse (2 2, 31).Elaboration of Marcuse's Theory Marcuse (2 2, 11) says that cities have always been divided and thatit is likely or at least possible that they will always be divided by suchvariables as status, culture, and function. 2 4. Accessed online September 29, 2 9.Crotty, S.M., and Fernando J. When one considers San Diego, Tim Chapin (2 2, 566) says that thecity center has been revitalized with a new downtown baseball stadium and arevitalization project impacting upon 75 acres of the downtown area. There are more than 25 gated communities with 3 to 4 percent of all developments built in the 198 s and 199 s constructed asprivatized communities. Ineach era, Marcuse (2 2, 17) sees one or more of the status, cultural, andfunctional divisions influencing the spatial division of urban enclaves andalso posits a specific role for the state. While San Diego's surrounding suburbs include both lowincome and middle to upper class areas, the subsidized or public housing inSan Diego remains in the central city. The theory developed by Marcuse (2 2, 1) supports the conclusionthat San Diego's government is working to ensure that the central city willonce again be a vibrant and desirable locus for residences as well asrecreation. 2 2. Land use in San Diego. http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/states/ 6/ 6 73.html. In the present era, Marcuse (2 2, 28) suggests that cities incountries like the United States have undergone a transformation from theFordist to the post-Fordist spatial divisions. As this analysisindicates, the theory allows one to understand how status, culture, andfunctionality influence the partitioning of cities. Accessed online September 29, 2 9.City of San Diego. 2 9. Interestingly, among themultiple family units, 23 percent or 1 9, 81 have 1 units or more,suggesting that these structures may well be condominiums or cooperativesin which units are owned rather than rented. ReferencesBislev, Sven. As anentrepreneurial city, San Diego is home to what Chapin (2 2, 57 ) sees asmunicipal capitalism exercised in downtown redevelopment through the CentreCity Development Corporation (CCDC). San Diego County in which San Diego itself is positioned, has beendescribed by the US Census Bureau (2 9, 1-2) as primarily consisting ofwhite citizens (79.5 percent) with less than 21.5 percent of the totalpopulation born in countries other than the United States, and 33 percentspeaking a language other than English at home. 2 8. Also supporting the theory of partitioning are data found in Table 5regarding residential land use. San Diego County, California. 2 9c. One must also look, according to Marcuse (2 2, 2 ) at such issues ashousing type or housing units in considering whether or not partitioning isoccurring in a particular city. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Smith, Betty E. Marcuse (2 2, 17) identifies seven historical types of cities fromthe early pre-capitalist city to the developed commercial city, thecolonial city, the early industrialized capitalist city, the mature andindustrialized Fordist city, the post-Fordist globalizing city, and thesocialist city. Finally, Marcuse (2 2, 17) sees a fluctuating role for the state inshaping spatial divisions throughout history. At its most simplistic, thetheory articulated by this analyst suggests that cities are culturallydivided by variables in language, dress, architectural style, ethnicity,nationality or country of origin, or lifestyle. The city of San Diego (2 9b, 1) reported that 66 percent or 626, 73of the population aged 16 and over are in the labor force with 58.4 percentin the civilian labor force and four percent in the armed forces. The socialist city, forexample, is planned and controlled by the state with respect to both theeconomy and land use whereas in both the Fordist and post-Fordist cities ofthe capitalist world, market supporting land use controls and eitherdiscriminatory or exclusionary state policies have shaped spatialdivisions. These data suggest that San Diego is very much a post-Fordist city.Indeed, Sven Bislev (2 4, 599) sees San Diego as one of the leaders interms of the number of gated high income communities in which privatizedsecurity services are available. Alternatives, 29: 599-618.Chapin, Tim. Some 42 percent of the employed civilian population aged 16 andolder are involved in these positions while only 16 percent are in theservice sector, 27 percent in the sales and office sector, seven percent inconstruction, and nine percent in production, transport, and materialmoving (City of San Diego, 2 9b, 1-2). Journal of Urban Affairs, 24: 565-581.City of San Diego. At issue herein is an analysis of the applicability of Marcuse's(2 2, 31) argument that there have always been divisions within cities andthat the state has been decisive in creating, maintaining, or destroyingpartitions. http://www.sandiego.gov/planning/programs/mapsua/ employment.shtml. Housing in San Diego. As Tables 1 through 3 in the Appendices illustrate, the population ofSan Diego tends to be engaged in the professional and related managerialsectors. Marcuse (2 2,12) states that "many of these lines, but not all, are social: divisionsbrought about by the conscious acts of their residents and those who holdpower or among them." Throughout his analysis of the partitioned city inhistory, Marcuse (2 2, 17) emphasizes the role of the state infacilitating the maintenance of society and the development of status,cultural and functional divisions which combine to figuratively as well asliterally partition or divide a city. Table 5 helps to validate this theory. Single family homes are positioned on37, 5 acres as compared to multiple family homes that are found on 1 ,22 acres. Given that mobilehomes are associated with lower income residents, this tends to support thecontention that San Diego is a more affluent community. Tables 2 and 3 found in the Appendices do support this assumption.With a median household income of $45,826, San Diego's citizenry qualify asmiddle to upper middle class, particularly in light of the fact that 47percent of the total population report incomes of more than $5 , peryear and fully 8 percent of all households have wage or salary income.Only a relatively small percentage (eight percent) have incomes of lessthan $1 , per year with 12 percent reporting incomes between $1 , and$19,999 (City of San Diego, 2 9b, 2). Of the total housing unitsavailable, only one percent or 5,853 are mobile homes. 2 4. San Diego Business Journal, 25: A21.Marcuse, Peter. Employment in San Diego. 2 9b. San Diego has a population of more than 1.25 million people and isthe seventh largest city in the United States and the second largest inCalifornia. Thirty-four percent of the total population is not in the labor force butunemployment represents only about 5.9 percent of the total population.Data regarding occupation is found in the Appendix as are data reflectinghousehold income and earnings and income. In Of States and Cities: The Partitioning of Urban Space, ed. The San Diego metropolitan area ranks seventeenth in thecountry and by 2 2 its population is forecast to be 1.69 million with acountry population of 3.85 million (The City of San Diego, 2 9a, 1).Attached as Figure A is a graph depicting the ethnic breakdown of SanDiego's population with 55 percent described as white, 23 percent asHispanic, 9 percent as black, and 13 percent as Asian and others. Accessed online September 29, 2 9.City of San Diego. Status divisions would be based on class, cultural divisions onethnicity, and functional divisions would be relatively insignificant inthat there would be a concentration of dominant services of a business orfinancial nature in the central city and the expansion of both service andmanufacturing work in edge cities within the metropolitan area (Marcuse,2 2, 28). These are the kinds of incomedifferentials by households which would support the notion that San Diegois a globalizing city where manufacturing and other production jobs arenoticeably absent perhaps due to their relocation outside of the citycenter. In terms of functionalrole, economics come into play; there are clear divisions betweenresidential and business, industrial, and other areas within cities.Zoning reinforces or maintains such divisions (Marcuse, 2 2, 13).Finally, differences in status are seen by this analyst as "reflecting andreinforcing relationships of power, of domination, exploitation, stateauthority" (Marcuse, 2 2, 13). The case of San Diego is particularly usefulbecause it is an older city which has undergone any number of changes overthe course of its life with one of the more dramatic changes being itstransformation from an agricultural community to an industrial communityand now to a globalizing commercial city (Bislev, 2 4, 6 1). 2 9d. Thissuggests that one would find in San Diego a substantial number of uppermiddle class and more affluent citizens and that there would be some fairlysharp divisions between different socioeconomic classes. Racial geographies and the challenges of day labor formalization: A case study from San Diego County. Beyond the entrepreneurial city: Municipal capitalism in San Diego. He sees post-Fordist orglobalizing cities as shaped by changes in employment patterns and changesin the distribution of income and wealth. The theory is useful because it allows social scientists to draw uponreadily available data to explore land use patterns and socialstratification in cities. He does note that the state has been less and less decisivetoday than it was in earlier eras because today, "its actions largelyreflect and reinforce the power of groups external to it and operatingthrough the market" (Marcuse, 2 2, 31). As one would expect in the post-Fordist globalizing city, there are no records of any substantialemployment in the farming, fishing, and forestry sectors and in themanufacturing sector, only minimal employment appears to be present. A bricks and mortar approach to revitalization is underway in SanDiego, spurred as one would anticipate by government activity. Forty-two percent of the housing units are multiple familyunits, accounting for 198,342 units overall. 2 6. http: //www.sandiego.gov/economic-development/glance /population/shtml. A small enclave of low density single family homes sits on 272acres where it is probable that the most affluent citizens and theirhouseholds reside (City of San Diego, 2 9d, 1). One would therefore expect tofind walled enclaves of the wealthy in suburbs or protected citadels in thecentral city that are surrounded by ghetto-like enclaves in which theethnic poor and working classes live.Implications of the Theory for San Diego If Marcuse (2 2, 31) is correct, one would expect that San Diego,California would present the divisions that are typical of the Fordistglobalizing city. It is interesting that among status divisions, from the earlyindustrialized capitalist city to the post-Fordist globalizing city, classwas the primary status division. This in turn suggeststhat lower income residents are marginalized and isolated or aggregatedinto specific sections of the city where rents are cheap and jobs arelikely to be scarce. The large number of single family homes and gated communitiesin San Diego suggest a more affluent population. Its society would be shaped by nonindustrial productiveforces and it would be a participant to some degree in a globalizedeconomy. Privatization of security as a governance problem: Gated communities in the San Diego region. Segregation in the area is commonand Crotty and Bosco (2 8, 24 ) state that homelessness has become asignificant problem as the industrial and manufacturing base of the cityand region diminishes. The effects of such divisions areinvariably felt in terms of tensions between different groups withinsociety as well as overt conflict between those groups and struggles foraccess to resources. Table 4 presents data describing the typesof housing units that are in San Diego and notes that there are 2.61persons per household on average. Urban Theory: San Diego as the Partitioned CityIntroduction Peter Marcuse (2 2, 12) in an essay titled, "The Partitioned City inHistory," makes the case that throughout history, cities have beenspatially divided into distinct residential and working enclaves based uponthree specific lines that can be categorized as divisions by culture, byfunctional role, and by position in the hierarchy of power. Of the total of219, acres in San Diego, there are 21, 4 acres for industrial andagricultural use with 13,965 acres used for commercial and office use.However, when one considers that San Diego has dedicated 62,31 acres topublicly maintained parks and 5,137 acres to schools, it becomes clear thatthe industrial and agricultural acreage is somewhat misleading (City of SanDiego, 2 9d, 1).

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