Beyond (and Back to) Ferguson: Race and Power(lessness) in American Cities
Thu, September 3, 2:00 to 3:45pm, Hilton, Continental Ballroom 4
Session Description
The contentious politics following the 2014 killing of Mike Brown by police officer Darren Wilson in Ferguson, Missouri, and the subsequent decision by a grand jury to not indict Wilson, as well as other non-indictments of police officers
for the homicides of Blacks (e.g., Eric Garner in New York City) and other racial minorities in other cities, small and large, compelled many political scientists to ponder whether we witnessed a mere “moment” of public attention to just another example of racial and spatial injustice or saw something special that could spark a new “movement” for deep democratic reforms to foster racial and spatial justice at the local level. Convening a year after the killing of Brown, and putting normative political theorists and urban and racial politics scholars in conversation and (hopefully productive) tension, this roundtable will identify the enduring political causes and consequences of America’s “Fergusons” and consider whether we can redesign the intersections and institutions of race, place, and power(lessness) to make them more just or at least less lethal for non-whites in American metropolises.
