Diversity is Key for urban Success

“…cultural diversity is as necessary for humankind as biodiversity is for nature (Art. 1) it is “one of the roots of development understood not simply in terms of economic growth, but also as a means to achieve a more satisfactory intellectual, emotional, moral and spiritual existence (Art. 3)”. Universal Declaration on Cultural Diversity (UNESCO, 2001)

If Noah was the first human to understood biodiversity when he took "two of each" on his ark, America may be the first nation to understand and embrace the value of cultural diversity. The country's once leading cities, New York, Philadelphia and Baltimore would never have attained their status without ship after ship delivering a steady stream of Poles, Russians, Lithuanians, Italians and Germans whose ethnic enclaves can be found to this day in churches, delis, meeting halls and festivals. 

Ukrainian Orthodox Church, Baltimore

From the current political discourse one wouldn’t know it, though. Political turmoil in several regions of the world and the resulting massive flows of refugees have brought about instability, fear and a closing of the ranks of those who think they have to defend their countries from being "overrun". Nations once known for a "welcome culture" towards others are shutting their borders.

Cities play a big role on either side of this issue. They were and are the places where immigrants wind up and they are and were the places instilling fear in the heart of many Americans. 

Shrinking cities like Baltimore have laid out once again a welcome-mat in hopes of benefiting from new residents. Flourishing cities like Munich, Germany which saw as many as 6,000 migrants arrive on a single weekend late last summer shifted soon from receiving refugees like celebrities to exasperation and exhaustion. It is only fitting that the Syria cease-fire negotiations are held in the same city.

Munich welcome culture

What is evident is that diversity cannot longer be organised in the mosaic of the nation-states but need to be addressed also at the city and local level. 
(Evidence of the Economic and Social Advantages of Intercultural Cities Approach
Meta-analytic assessment By Kseniya Khovanova-Rubicondo and Dino Pinelli, March 2012)

Cities have been places of diversity by being the locus for markets, trade, exchange and communication throughout history. Even in historic times when change was glacial and truthful replication of the life of the forebears a virtue, new ideas, different habits, other beliefs were to be found in cities where the knowledge of the time was concentrated. 

Today populations have gravitated towards metropolitan areas all around the globe for those same reasons: cities as places of promise, a new beginning, a place for start-ups as it is called today. Depending on the source, somewhere between 63% and 80% of Americans now live in urbanized areas. Demographers tell us that in a few decades the US will be a nation where all minorities combined will be the majority. This is already the case in major metro areas such as Los Angeles. One would think anti-urban sentiments would be in decline.

However, the more the long held status-quo of a white Christian majority is disintegrating, otherness is seen as a threat, and voices become shriller. When people say they are "tired of being politically correct", they want to get rid of the civility that demands to not speak disparagingly about people that are different. Respect for others who are different and whom we may not fully understand is one of the essential elements of the progress humanity has made towards becoming more civilized. 

Speaking badly of others and saying they don't fit in and are incapable of adapting to "our" culture has a long and terrible history full of atrocities against "the other", whether those were women (witches), gays and lesbians (abnormal), Native Americans (savages) or Jews (all kinds of arguments too idiotic to repeat here). The less a person is familiar with otherness, the less tolerance they have for it. The further back in time we go, the less likely people encountered much "otherness" because the circles where tight and the world was small.

Lithuanian hall, Baltimore

So how, then, is it possible that in an urbanized world that is hyper-mobile with so much travel and so much information, that we see so much provincialism?  One of the less expected answers could be sprawl!

In the US so much of the growth towards metro areas has settled in the periphery and fringes of core cities that the so called "age of cities" should better be called the "age of suburbs". In the fringe suburb the rural, provincial mindset that prefers homogeneity over diversity has found its last refuge. Gated communities, home-builder driven income stratification ("homes in the lower $300,000s"), neighborhood watches, covenants and strict design guidelines virtually ensured that "the other" was kept out. "The design of exclusion" succeeded in creating bastions of social, architectural and ethnic uniformity which in turn attracted more of the same.  The creation of the mono-culture of the suburb coincided with similar dead-end avenues in agriculture (one single crop instead of crop rotation, mass industrial type meat production instead of a diversity of animals), and forestry (logging-oriented single species forests) and manufacturing (mass production of a single widget). All of these areas  are retooling now towards diversity for sustainability and more resilience.

The mechanism of segregation delivered large and predictable voting blocks hostile to diversity. In light of the inevitability that even those bastions will eventually crumble, an amazing amalgam of fear and anger traverses large parts of the American landscape from rural areas deep into the metro areas. Even so called blue states like Maryland find themselves governed by a suburban and Republican governor.

 

The consequences of segregation: Unrest

Admittedly real life is more complex than this description. Diverse suburbs do exist and clearly, there are many other factors than diversity that fuel anger, frustration and fear, including tricky economic conditions which to discuss here exceeds the limitations of a blog. For sure, many cities in Europe feel under siege when thousands of refugees have to be accommodated day after day. For sure, there are physical limits how many people those cities can process, accommodate and feed, physical limitations beyond the question of otherness or culture. And yet: Much of the acrimony present in Italy, France, Germany, Poland and in the US can be derived from an aversion to diversity.

This aversion plays out at a time when urbanity and multiculturalism appear to have gained the upper hand with two huge demographic blocks, the baby boomers and the millennials, both clamoring for the city precisely for the reason that they wanted to flee the anti-intellectual mono-culture of the suburb. As a result, we have the bifurcation of the American (political) landscape, where communication "across the aisle" has been replaced by hostility across the trenches.

It is intriguing to investigate the duality of the role cities can play in this. Does the city have to be simply the punching bag for suburbanites who point to the entrenched poverty, incompetence, poor services and badly performing schools as exhibits of the inferiority of city living or can the city rise above those limitations and become what it is supposed to be in its very essence, a center of opportunity?

Mom and opo store revival through immigrants 

The demographic trends are unavoidable, whether "a wall" will be built on the Mexican border or not. But how ugly it will get and how much the angry, frustrated and fearful will take "a last stand" could be decided by cities: how convincing they are as role models of integration. How well opportunity can open up those entrenched pockets of poverty that exist even in the most prosperous and fastest growing cities, just as they do in the rural regions of West Virginia or eastern Kentucky but with much less prospect of being dislodged.

As already alluded to, diversity isn't just a matter of culture and race. Diversity is vital when it comes to bio-diversity, it is good in the economy and it’s an essential ingredient of the built environment as well. The standard suburban model is not only failing because of its lack of cultural diversity but also so for a lack of diversity in land use, transportation options, architectural styles, cultural offerings and a meaningful quality public realm.

Diversity in all those fields is the strength of the city. A good city is a jumble of different architecture styles and scales, redundant ways to get around, a rich mix of land uses and a plethora of cultural offerings. And yes, even biodiversity. It is no accident that most of the few remaining old growth trees in Maryland are found in an urban park in Baltimore. 

Most importantly perhaps, a city offers public spaces where to mingle, rest, observe, express oneself or be seen. Spaces to stick out or blend in, just as one chooses. At a time when American cities had diminished and sacrificed their public domain, the influx of other cultures has strengthened the public space of our cities. The public realm which car culture had too willingly offered up to the automobile is little by little taken back by pedestrians, bicycles and those who simply enjoy urban company. Immigrants from countries with a preserved culture of walking, eating outside and having small mom and pop retail have "colonized" many half-abandoned urban quarters in US cities and re-infused the vibrancy of the places they knew from home. North American cities have become better and more livable for it, so have the food, beer, bread and coffee choices, the restaurants, grocery stores and the public markets.

It is well known that our fruits wouldn't be harvested and our trash wouldn't be picked up without immigrants. It is often forgotten, though, that hospital care is dependent on foreign doctors, high school classes score higher because of the work ethic immigrants have brought, that orchestras rely on immigrant violinists and that research would stagnate without the influx of foreigners achieving academic excellence in our universities.

In considering the future city in the age of information and knowledge, diversity is the key ingredient for success. Culturally, economically, socially and biologically.

Klaus Philipsen, FAIA
edited by Ben Groff, JD

Related article on this blog: Immigration Fuels Revitalization

Links:

Unesco Declaration of Cultural Diversity
Rankings of Diversity (NextCity) (Wallethub)
Why We Value Diversity

Unlocking the benefits of diversity
How diversity leads to economic growth (CityLab)
Evidence of the Economic and Social Advantages of Intercultural Cities Approach

Promoting Neighborhood Diversity: Benefits, Barriers, and Strategies

Below the rankings of the 15 largest US cities in various diversity categories. In the full list Baltimore has an overall diversity ranking of 196th, i.e. very near the bottom. This may surprise many who call Baltimore "very diverse" as code for having a high percentage of African American population. But it is precisely the large number of neighborhoods that have segregated to a point where they are 99% African American that is the opposite of diversity.