Joel Kotkin

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Kotkin speaks at Texas Tech University in 2019 Joel Kotkin at Free Market Institute.jpg
Kotkin speaks at Texas Tech University in 2019

Joel Kotkin (born December 28, 1952) is a fellow in urban studies at Chapman University in Orange, California. [1] He writes about demographic, social, and economic trends in the U.S. and internationally. [2] He is a regular contributor to The Daily Beast [3] and the conservative magazine The Spectator . [4] He is the elder brother of historian Stephen Kotkin. [5]

Contents

Books and thought

Kotkin is the author of several books. The New Class Conflict was published in September 2014 by Telos Press Publishing. In this book, Kotkin assesses the changing complexities of class in the United States, which he argues can no longer be understood in terms of traditional political divisions between left and right or conservative and liberal. For Kotkin, the new class order of the twenty-first century is marked by the rise of a high-tech oligarchy, a culturally dominant academic and media (both journalism and entertainment) elite, an expansive government bureaucracy, and a declining middle class. [6] [7] [8]

In The Next Hundred Million: America in 2050 (Penguin Press, 2010), [9] Kotkin speculated how the nation might evolve in the next four decades.

He has also authored The City: A Global History and The New Geography, books about city development, and has studied various major cities, including Houston, New Orleans, New York, St. Louis, and Los Angeles. [10] Previously he was a fellow at the New America Foundation, Pepperdine University, and at the Milken Institute. In addition, he was a columnist for the New York Times , a business reporter at KTTV, and was West Coast editor for Inc. magazine.[ citation needed ]

Kotkin argues that the model of urban development as exemplified by pre-automobile cities such as New York City and Paris is outdated in many cases. Kotkin believes in a "back to basics" approach which stresses nurturing the middle class and families with traditional suburban development. He states that the current trend of growth of suburbs will be the dominant pattern around the world. [11] As a result, one of his arguments is that rail transit is not always ideal for modern cities and suburbs. [12]

Kotkin wrote The Coming of Neo-Feudalism: A Warning to the Global Middle Class (Encounter Books, 2020). [13]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Suburb</span> Human settlement within a metropolitan area

A suburb is an area within a metropolitan area which often contains most of the area's economic activity, which may include commercial and mixed-use. A suburb can exist either as part of a larger city/urban area or as a separate political entity. The name describes an area that is either more or less densely populated than an inner city. In many metropolitan areas suburbs rise in population during the day and are where most jobs are located; being major commercial and job hubs, many suburbs also exist as separate residential communities within commuting distance of a larger city. Suburbs can have their own political or legal jurisdiction, especially in the United States, but this is not always the case, especially in the United Kingdom, where most suburbs are located within the administrative boundaries of cities. In most English-speaking countries, suburban areas are defined in contrast to central city or inner city areas, but in Australian English and South African English, suburb has become largely synonymous with what is called a "neighborhood" in the U.S., but it is used in contrast with inner city areas.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ghetto</span> Neighborhood inhabited by a minority group, usually when poor

A ghetto is a part of a city in which members of a minority group are concentrated, especially as a result of political, social, legal, religious, environmental or economic pressure. Ghettos are often known for being more impoverished than other areas of the city. Versions of such restricted areas have been found across the world, each with their own names, classifications, and groupings of people.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Exurb</span> Area of lower population density than suburbs

An exurb is an area outside the typically denser inner suburban area, at the edge of a metropolitan area, which has some economic and commuting connection to the metro area, low housing density, and growth. It shapes an interface between urban and rural landscapes holding a limited urban nature for its functional, economic, and social interaction with the urban center, due to its dominant residential character. Exurbs consist of "agglomerations of housing and jobs outside the municipal boundaries of a primary city" and beyond the surrounding suburbs.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">New Urbanism</span> Urban design movement promoting sustainable land use

New Urbanism is an urban design movement that promotes environmentally friendly habits by creating walkable neighbourhoods containing a wide range of housing and job types. It arose in the United States in the early 1980s, and has gradually influenced many aspects of real estate development, urban planning, and municipal land-use strategies. New Urbanism attempts to address the ills associated with urban sprawl and post-Second World War suburban development.

Neo-feudalism or new feudalism is a theorized contemporary rebirth of policies of governance, economy, and public life, reminiscent of those which were present in many feudal societies. Such aspects include, but are not limited to: Unequal rights and legal protections for common people and for nobility, dominance of societies by a small and powerful elite, a lack of social mobility, and relations of lordship and serfdom between the elite and the people, where the former are rich and the latter poor.

<i>City Journal</i> Conservative policy magazine

City Journal is a public policy magazine and website, published by the conservative Manhattan Institute for Policy Research, that covers a range of topics on urban affairs, such as policing, education, housing, and other issues. The magazine also publishes articles on arts and culture, urban architecture, family culture, and other topics. The magazine began publishing in 1990.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ruling class</span> Social class of a given society that decides upon and sets that societys political agenda

In sociology, the ruling class of a society is the social class who set and decide the political and economic agenda of society.

A streetcar suburb is a residential community whose growth and development was strongly shaped by the use of streetcar lines as a primary means of transportation. Such suburbs developed in the United States in the years before the automobile, when the introduction of the electric trolley or streetcar allowed the nation’s burgeoning middle class to move beyond the central city’s borders. Early suburbs were served by horsecars, but by the late 19th century cable cars and electric streetcars, or trams, were used, allowing residences to be built farther away from the urban core of a city. Streetcar suburbs, usually called additions or extensions at the time, were the forerunner of today's suburbs in the United States and Canada. San Francisco's Western Addition is one of the best examples of streetcar suburbs before westward and southward expansion occurred.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Suburbanization</span> Population shift from central urban areas into suburbs

Suburbanization (AE), or suburbanisation (BE), is a population shift from historic core cities or rural areas into suburbs, resulting in the formation of (sub)urban sprawl. As a consequence of the movement of households and businesses away from city centers, low-density, peripheral urban areas grow.

On October 7, 1873, Brookline, Massachusetts rejected annexation by a larger neighboring city when it voted down annexation by Boston. When its citizens voted 707-299 to keep its independence, Brookline not only stopped Boston's string of annexations, but it also set an example for wealthy suburbs throughout America. The vote was a significant event in the history of American suburbs.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Stephen Kotkin</span> American historian, academic and author (born 1959)

Stephen Mark Kotkin is an American historian, academic, and author. He is the Kleinheinz Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution and a senior fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies at Stanford University. For 33 years, Kotkin taught at Princeton University, where he attained the title of John P. Birkelund '52 Professor in History and International Affairs; he took on emeritus status from Princeton University in 2022. He was the director of the Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies and the co-director of the certificate-granting program in History and the Practice of Diplomacy. He has won a number of awards and fellowships, including the Guggenheim Fellowship, the American Council of Learned Societies, and the National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship. He is the husband of curator and art historian Soyoung Lee, and the younger brother of columnist Joel Kotkin.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dean Obeidallah</span> American journalist and comedian

Dean Obeidallah is an American lawyer, comedian, and journalist. He is the host of SiriusXM Progress' The Dean Obeidallah Show and a frequent contributor to CNN, The Daily Beast, and MSNBC.

Urban history is a field of history that examines the historical nature of cities and towns, and the process of urbanization. The approach is often multidisciplinary, crossing boundaries into fields like social history, architectural history, urban sociology, urban geography, business history, and archaeology. Urbanization and industrialization were popular themes for 20th-century historians, often tied to an implicit model of modernization, or the transformation of rural traditional societies.

The African-American middle class consists of African-Americans who have middle-class status within the American class structure. It is a societal level within the African-American community that primarily began to develop in the early 1960s, when the ongoing Civil Rights Movement led to the outlawing of de jure racial segregation. The African American middle class exists throughout the United States, particularly in the Northeast and in the South, with the largest contiguous majority black middle-class neighborhoods being in the Washington, DC suburbs in Maryland. The African American middle class is also prevalent in the Atlanta, Charlotte, Houston, Dallas, Los Angeles, New Orleans, New York, San Antonio and Chicago areas.

Ethnic succession theory is a theory in sociology stating that ethnic and racial groups entering a new area may settle in older neighborhoods or urban areas until achieving economic parity with certain economic classes. The concept of succession is well established in "both ecological and economic models of urban residential change." As the newer group becomes economically successful, it moves to a better residential area. With continued immigration, a new ethnic group will settle in the older neighborhood in a similar starting situation. This pattern will continue, creating a succession of groups moving through the neighborhood over time. Ethnic succession has taken place in most major United States cities, but is most well known in New York City, where this process has been observed since the 19th century.

<i>Crabgrass Frontier</i> 1985 book by Kenneth T. Jackson

Crabgrass Frontier: The Suburbanization of the United States is a book written by historian Kenneth T. Jackson and published in 1985. Extensively researched and referenced, the book takes into account factors that promoted the suburbanization of the United States, such as the availability of cheap land, construction methods, and transportation, as well as federal subsidies for highways and suburban housing.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Elizabeth A. R. Brown</span> Professor Emerita of history, known for her research on feudalism

Elizabeth Atkinson Rash Brown is a professor emerita of history at Brooklyn College, of the City University of New York, a scholar and published author, known for her writings on feudalism. She received her B.A. from Swarthmore College and A.M. and PhD. from Radcliffe College and Harvard University. In 2009 Elizabeth A. R. Brown was elected the Second Vice-President of the Medieval Academy of America and in 2010-2011 served as its president.

Political Marxism (PM) is a strand of Marxist theory that places history at the centre of its analysis. It is also referred to as a form of neo-Marxism.

<i>The Next Hundred Million</i>

The Next Hundred Million: America in 2050 is a non-fiction book by American economist and demographer Joel Kotkin. The author outlines a world in which the growing US population reaches four hundred million by 2050. He argues that the US will become more diverse and more competitive, and he predicts that the US will experience continual economic growth that advances the population's standard of living. Kotkin writes that the US "should emerge by mid-century as the most affluent, culturally rich and successful nation in human history".

Kyle Chapman, also known by the nickname Based Stickman, is an American white nationalist and alt-right activist. He earned his nickname and prominence in the alt-right movement after he was recorded beating an anti-fascist counter-protester with a stick at the March 2017 March 4 Trump rally in Berkeley, California. Shortly after, he founded the Fraternal Order of the Alt-Knights (FOAK), a paramilitary group that is considered a partner or subgroup of the far-right, neo-fascist Proud Boys organization. He led the FOAK until later that year, when he faded from his leadership position following an assault conviction related to the March 4 Trump rally. In November 2020, Chapman announced an attempted takeover of the Proud Boys organization, as well as a plan to reform the group as an explicitly white supremacist organization. The attempted coup was not successful.

References

  1. "Faculty Directory". Chapman University.
  2. "Our Group". Praxis Strategy Group.
  3. "Contributors: Joel Kotkin". The Daily Beast . 14 May 2022. Retrieved 25 July 2023.
  4. "Writers: Joel Kotkin". Spectator . Retrieved 17 September 2023.
  5. "Joel Kotkin – Warns Middle, Working Classes, Retirees – How Elite Oligarchs Control Many Democrats, Numbers of Republicans Create Neo-Fascist Ruling Elite Pushing a New Feudalism – Report & Analysis". 8 July 2021.
  6. Kotkin, Joel (10 August 2014). "In the Future We'll All Be Renters: America's Disappearing Middle Class". The Daily Beast. Retrieved 1 September 2014.
  7. Reynolds, Glenn Harlan (September 10, 2014). "America's New Class System". USA Today . Retrieved 12 September 2014.
  8. Bauer, Fred (September 11, 2014). "A Divided America". National Review .
  9. Sohn, Ira. "Review of The Next Hundred Million" (PDF). Foresight (Summer 2010): 43–45. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2011-07-26. Retrieved 2010-12-01.
  10. Renn, Aaron M. "Joel Kotkin on the Future of the Heartland". The Urbanophile.
  11. Roberts, Sam (February 25, 2010). "A Nation 400 Million Strong". The New York Times .
  12. Keough, Robert (January 1, 2006). "Development Expert Joel Kotkin on Suburban Life: Mend It, Don't Try to End It". CommonWealth Magazine. Archived from the original on 2014-09-12.
  13. Price, Robert Grant (November 8, 2020). "The Never-Ending Threat of Utopia". The University Bookman . Retrieved January 22, 2021.