A number of other places in the United States, Canada, Europe, and Latin America experienced the sorts of government reform that happened in the cities with major representation in this collection, but we lack sufficient information to include “pages” describing them. We hope to get a selection of materials from the main cities in such places: Montreal, Toronto, and Vancouver in Canada; Bologna and other Italian places, and selected Latin American cities.
In other cases progressives never achieved full control or their efforts were abortive, but nevertheless seem worth reporting.
We will note both sorts of cases here – some with attached documents – or a “sub-page” where there is enough information to warrant it.
For lack of first hand information, we have not mentioned Richmond, CA, but have seen Alex Schafran and Lisa Feldstein. “Black, Brown, White and Green: Race, Land Use and Environmental Politics in a Changing Richmond,” in Social Justice in the Suburbs (working title), ed. Christopher Neidt, Temple University Press, 2013; and recent posts on its plan to use eminent domain to save “underwater” mortgages (and its tax base): see Peter Dreier on Richmond: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/peter-dreier/california-defies-wall-st_b_3909022.html
Nor have we created a page for Binghamton, NY though we’ve had the benefit of Sean Bennett’s Cornell Working Paper Neighborhood Engagement in Binghamton, NY (2011). Both mayoralties began after 2000 and remain in office in 2013.
We have too little information about San Francisco or Santa Cruz, California. On San Francisco, we recommend Richard DeLeon, Left Coast City and Stephen McGovern, The Politics of Downtown Development.
On Santa Cruz, see Richard Gendron and G. William Domhoff, The Leftmost City: Power and Progressive Politics in Santa Cruz (2009).
Claire Benit-Gbaffou writes of Post apartheid Johannesburg planners (2012) describing their experiences pushing for reforms.
Jonathan Thompson reports on the Chicano Takeover in Crystal City, Texas in the 1970s.
Johnathan Thompson on Detroit, a “could have been” progressive city