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RUTH PETERSON and Lauren Krivo’s unprecedented study of nearly
ten thousand American urban neighborhoods reveals a nation
racially divided, with violent and deadly consequences. The depth
and detail of Peterson and Krivo’s findings are particularly disturbing
because while the circumstances of the racial divide in America have
changed in some notable ways over time, the violent consequences
nonetheless reflect a continuity that has produced a mounting toll for
African and Latino Americans. The result is a nation still dangerously
divided by race long after W. E. B. Du Bois (1899/1973) warned that
violence was only one part of the reality of more widespread racial
disparities. The deadly consequences would persist, Du Bois warned,
unless we addressed the pervasiveness of the disparities.
As Du Bois anticipated, and Peterson and Krivo document, there is a
stubborn and entrenched nature to the social and economic disparities in
America’s neighborhoods. The racial disparities are so persistent that today
urban America still has virtually no equally economically situated black
and white neighborhoods. In particular, there are few—if any—white
neighborhoods as poor as the poorest black neighborhoods. Peterson and
Krivo call this an American “racial-spatial divide” that sharply separates
people by segregating the places where they predominantly reside.
Poverty nearly completely overlaps with race along this racial-spatial
divide, and this racial concentration of poverty and other socioeconomic
disadvantages lead to a racial concentration of violence. The impinging
proximity of nearby neighborhoods plagued by similar social and economic
circumstances magnifies these violent consequences.
Racial segregation, poverty concentration, and the magnified consequences
of proximity are thus the key elements in Peterson and Krivo’s
analysis of America’s racial-spatial divide. It is tempting to believe that
knowing about these elements effectively provides a path to reversing
their effects, but Peterson and Krivo’s findings are not reassuring. Their
historical mentor, Du Bois, was skeptical about simple solutions, and
Peterson and Krivo’s comprehensive analysis also suggests reasons to
be incredulous.