On Turning Public Spaces Into Forces of Consumption
The common spaces traditionally provided for the public are slowly being eroded in the name of economic efficiency, victim to the ideology of pervasive market fundamentalism that serves as the scourge of our age. On the front edge of post industrialism, those in Detroit are experiencing this first hand. A non-elected, state appointed Emergency Manager is slowly selling off city services, cutting what were constitutionally guaranteed pensions, and ignoring an emasculated, but fairly elected city council. Shea Howell calls this a “state of siege.” With Detroit now under emergency management, half the blacks in the state of Michigan are now without a say in their local government.
All of this parallels a privatization of public education that is occurring simultaneously. Major urban cities like Detroit, Chicago, Philadelphia, New Orleans and others have had their public spaces of education privatized into for profit charter schools. School closings have run rampant, decimating