The Chicago metropolitan area in the early 21st century is a prime testing ground for the broad concepts and particular approaches to public policy associated with Neoliberalism. Over a span of 25 years Chicago’s municipal government has aggressively closed public schools and supported the formation of charter schools, demolished all high-rise family public housing in favor of mixed-income, new urbanist communities, adopted increasingly advanced police surveillance technologies, and privatized various public facilities through long-term agreements with private vendors. In a parallel fashion, N ... More

The Chicago metropolitan area in the early 21st century is a prime testing ground for the broad concepts and particular approaches to public policy associated with Neoliberalism. Over a span of 25 years Chicago’s municipal government has aggressively closed public schools and supported the formation of charter schools, demolished all high-rise family public housing in favor of mixed-income, new urbanist communities, adopted increasingly advanced police surveillance technologies, and privatized various public facilities through long-term agreements with private vendors. In a parallel fashion, Neoliberal thinking and rhetoric shape various components of the city’s cultural landscape, from the logic of historic preservation to popular understandings of environmentalism and even sports partisanship. Finally, the emergence of Neoliberal Chicago is most evident through its changing cityscape, the processes by which older neighborhoods evolve due to gentrification or disinvestment and new neighborhoods are created. Though Chicago, like many other U.S. metropolitan areas, was severely tested by the mortgage foreclosure and broader economic crisis of 2007-8, its trajectory of Neoliberal government action was already fixed in place. The consequence has been a layering of new inequalities atop an already socially, economically, and geographically divided metropolis.