Society for the Study of Social Problems COMMUNITY RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT DIVISION Fall 2010 In this issue: => Message from the Division Chair => 2011 Graduate Student Paper Competition => Spotlight on Research: The Ecology of Ethnic Succession in Chicago => Spotlight on Research: CalHousing Inegration Set-Aside (HISA) Task Force => Spotlight on Research: SLULATINO: Action Research for Latinos Living in the Saint Louis Metropolitan Region => From the Blogosphere => Winners 2010 Graduate Student Paper Competition => Announcements => 2011 Division Conference Sessions +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+- MESSAGE FROM THE DIVISION CHAIR Heather MacIndoe, University of Massachusetts, Boston Greetings members and friends of the Community Research and Development Division of SSSP! Thanks to all of you who participated in the 2010 CRD Division events at this summer's annual meeting in Atlanta. There were many engaging and thoughtful conversations. My hope is that you made useful connections and found renewed energy for this academic year. Let's hope that next year's gathering in Chicago will yield similar results. This newsletter highlights some key happenings in the division including a listing of division paper sessions for the 2011 SSSP gathering. Thanks to those who contributed content for this edition. If you have suggestions you would like featured in a future newsletter, please email me: Heather.MacIndoe@umb.edu 2011 GRADUATE STUDENT PAPER COMPETITION Community Research and Development Division - DEADLINE May 31st, 2010 Encourage your graduate students to submit papers to the student paper competition! Papers can focus on various aspects of the community including its capacity (e.g., social capital), development, renewal, and its relationship with other social issues or problems. Qualitative and quantitative empirical analyses and theoretical papers are welcome. The winner will receive a $150 cash award at the SSSP 2011 Annual Meeting August 12-14, 2011, registration for the meetings, a ticket to the Awards Banquet, and the opportunity to present her/his paper at the SSSP meetings in Chicago, Illinois. To be eligible for submission: => A paper must not yet be published or accepted for publication => Papers must be student-authored, one or more student authors is acceptable, but papers may not be co-authored with a faculty member or other non-student. => Papers must not exceed 25 pages including all notes, references, and tables. => To be considered for the award, the author must make a commitment to present the paper at a Community Research and Development Division session during the 2011 SSSP meeting. Please include the following with your paper submission: => A brief letter from each author's advisor certifying the person's status as a student and including some comments about the research. => 2 copies of the paper with a cover letter to: Andrea Leverentz, PhD University of Massachusetts Boston 100 Morrissey Boulevard Boston, MA 02125 Andrea.Leverentz@umb.edu Committee Members: Andrea Leverentz, University of Massachusetts Boston (chair) and Sondra Fogel, University of South Florida. SPOTLIGHT ON RESEARCH: The Ecology of Ethnic Succession in Chicago by Frank W. Young, Cornell University This statistical study uses the well-known Local Community Fact Book for comparing the 77 "community areas" in Chicago, 1980, 1990 and 2000, to test the fundamental ecological hypothesis that strong communities faced with an existential threat will borrow or invent more successful responses than weak communities. Stated in this ordinary language the hypothesis is not testable, but one goal of the research is to operationalize the terms in the hypothesis for research purposes. Thus, "existential threat" can mean the possibility of genocide, but in this case, it means the threat of replacement of the community residents by another ethnic group as measured by the percent increase of African Americans and Hispanics during 1990-2000. Measuring strong and weak communities is more difficult but still possible. I was drawn to the Chicago data because for some time I had been searching for a test situation for this hypothesis. I noticed that Wilson and Taub (2006:178) had extracted the same hypothesis in their book There Goes the Neighborhood (Alfred A Knopf, 2006) which analyzed ethnic succession in four of the 77 Chicago communities. A test was possible if I assumed that the threat of ethnic "invasion" was pervasive in these communities and, second, that the residents believed that excluding an ethnic group from their neighborhood, or at least managing the influx, was the best response. Then the percent increase of Hispanic and African-American residents in the 1990-2000 decade should be inversely related to the organizational strength of their communities. Strong communities are conceptualized as showing superior problem-solving capacity, specifically, institutionalized capacity for bringing specialized knowledge to bear on the problem, for debating alternative policies and, if these fail, to mobilize behind a reform movement. Measurement and the analysis of relationships for this study have been quite demanding but the results so far are promising. This and similar studies remind us that territorial takeover and resegregation in various forms (infiltration, war, ethnic cleansing, genocide) is the primordial social problem in human communities. SPOTLIGHT ON RESEARCH: CalHousing Integration Set-Aside (HISA) Task Force by Juliet Saltman, Kent State University (retired) The HISA Task Force was formed in November 1990 as an outgrowth of a two-day regional conference on ending racism and is an outgrowth from Saltman's contribution to the book A Fragile Movement: The Struggle for Neighborhood Stabilization (Greenwood, l990). Over 200 delegates to the conference selected "Integration Incentive$" as the one project they thought should be implemented in the San Diego area. Volunteers were sought to work on this concept, which incentivizes housing relocation to less concentrated areas in the city. The HISA Task Force first worked to inform key civic and civil rights organizations in the San Diego area about the HISA concept of Integration Incentive$ (financial incentives for deconcentrated moves) and to secure their endorsement of the concept. This phase took several years. The project is entirely volunteer and unfunded, with occasional small grants for operating expenses and conducting regional and statewide workshops. The first San Diego group to endorse the HISA concept was the Ecumenical Conference, followed by the Housing Commission, the NAACP, UPAC, the Chicano Federation, the Mayor and a majority of City Council, the Urban league, the Fair Housing Council, the County Board of Supervisors and other leading civic groups noted on our two page list of endorsements. We asked each of the San Diego Endorsers to help us develop a full Proposal for an Incentive$ program, which is now on the World Wide Web (fairhousing.com, in Other Resources). Statewide, we also secured the endorsements of 64 California housing agencies and organizations in 19 different counties of the state, and 20 state Assembly members and 15 state Senators. In 2001, eight years after we began active local lobbying, a unanimous City Council recommended that the San Diego Housing Commission establish a Relocation Fund to help low-income home-seekers move to less concentrated areas. The Fund is used for security deposits for Section 8 low-income renters, was begun in 2002 and has been renewed each year since. It is funded by the Housing Commission and administered by the Fair Housing Council. To date, over 100 families have moved to less concentrated areas, assisted with security deposits from this Fund. We believe this may well be the most cost-effective program in the city of San Diego. The Relocation Fund achieves two of the vital goals stated in city documents, and required by HUD: "First, "Reducing isolation of low-income and minority groups ...by deconcentrating affordable-housing opportunities...", and Second, "Empowering low-income persons ...to achieve self-sufficiency". This Fund promotes freedom of choice in housing and deconcentrated mobility. It enables low-income families to live in neighborhoods that offer better schools, better housing, and better job opportunities. We know from previous research that these lead to greater lifetime earnings, and the chance to leave welfare and become self-sufficient. Children have a greater probability of a higher education, job achievement, and lifetime earnings as well. For $15,000 a year San Diego has been improving the life chances of 35 to 50 families a year. We continue to advocate for continued and increased funding of this worthy, vital mobility program. SPOTLIGHT ON RESEARCH: SLULATINO: Action Research for Latinos Living in the Saint Louis Metropolitan Region by J.S. Onˇsimo Sandoval and Joel Jennings, Saint Louis University In 2008, Professor Sandoval and Professor Joel Jennings started an academic initiative that examines the quality of life of Latino immigrants and native born Latinos in the Saint Louis metropolitan region (i.e., SLULATINO). The initiative has grown to include multiple faculty and departments at Saint Louis University. One of the unique aspects of SLULATINO is the university and community research board also as known by its official name as the St. Louis Coalition for Latino Research. The research board is likely one of the first multi-disciplinary, community-based and regionally-based research coalitions for Latino Studies. Members include Washington University, University of Missouri, Saint Louis, and several non-profits organizations working with Latinos in the Saint Louis metropolitan region. The principle goal of SLULATINO is to privilege research that solves immediate problems or research that is accessible to non-profit organizations and the general public. SLULATINO has the breadth and depth to look at the entire life experiences of Latinos, and because all of the members are local, we have the relationships and flexibility to respond to immediate needs. The second goal of SLULATINO is to create research projects with community organizations where SLULATINO and community organizations are co-researchers, co-methodologists, co-analysts, and co-authors. Using this action research approach, two projects have been developed with two different organizations. The first project is a state-wide study of attitudes toward immigrants. Our partner in this study is The Missouri Immigrant and Refugee Advocates (MIRA). This project consists of three phases: (1) 30 in-depth interviews, (2) 1,000 random sample telephone interview that explores different dimensions of attitudes towards immigrants, and (3) the creation of a public campaign to welcome immigrants to Missouri. A paper has been developed that focuses on the findings from the qualitative interviews. The quantitative results will be available October 12, 2010 and a public campaign will be implemented in November 2010. The second project is a study with the Catholic Archdiocese of Saint Louis. The Hispanic Pastoral Ministers Council (HPMC) approached SLULATINO and asked us to help design a study to assess the quality of spiritual life among Latino immigrants who attend Spanish speaking mass. Over 1,000 Latino immigrants were interviewed. We are currently in the process of analyzing the data and writing the final report with HPMC. The report will be used for the 5 year pastoral plan for the Latino Catholic community in Saint Louis. In addition to these projects, Professor Sandoval and Jennings have already completed two projects for SLULATINO and two papers currently are under review. The first project focused on Civic Participation among 560 Latino immigrants. In this paper, we provide evidence that civic habitus, party identification, and, to lesser extent, legal status, play an important role in explaining civic engagement among Latino immigrants. The second paper focused on obesity and Latinos in Missouri. The findings from this study suggest a need for tailored and targeted interventions for the Latino community in Missouri coupled with statewide policy around physical activity and nutrition in order to reach the Latino population. RESOURCES: FROM THE BLOGOSPHERE a selection of interesting finds New Geography http://www.newgeography.com/category/story-topics/urban-issues "NewGeography.com is devoted to analyzing and discussing the places where we live and work. We want to know not only what is happening, but also how you, your company and your community can best adapt to rapidly changing conditions. It focuses on economic development, metropolitan demographics, and community leadership." International Association of Community Development - http://www.iacdglobal.org/blog "IACD is an international membership organization for those working in or supporting community development and is open to both individuals and organizations. IACD is a volunteer led, not-for-profit, non-governmental organization committed to building a global network of people and organizations working toward social justice through a community development approach. The IACD seeks to promote community development across international policies and programs, to network and support community development practitioners and to encourage information and practice exchange. IACD has recognized NGO consultative status with the United Nations." Urban Affairs Review - RSS Feeds - http://uar.sagepub.com/rss/ "Urban Affairs Review and many other journals published by Sage (i.e. Urban Studies, Action Research) have RSS feeds that can inform you of current and archived issues. RSS feeds provide web content, or summaries of web content, together with links to the full versions of the content. The RSS feeds allow you to bring together the latest tables of contents for your favourite SAGE journals into your web page or RSS reader. There is no limit to how many SAGE journal tables of contents you can receive via RSS feeds." Building Neighborhoods: Coverage of Federal Urban Policy from United Neighborhood Centers of America - http://unca-acf.org/ "Building Neighborhoods covers federal urban policy, with a focus on President Obama's Promise Neighborhoods initiative and similar state and local place-based efforts. Building Neighborhoods is a project of United Neighborhood Centers of America." Our Blocks: Building Blocks for Building Communities - http://ourblocks.net/#blogroll "Our Blocks provides a range of resources for those interested in community development and improving the quality of neighborhoods. The resources are primarily oriented towards practice and include online libraries, blogs, case studies, best practices and lessons learned." Urban Orgs: New Thinking about Organizations, Inequality and Urban Conditions - http://urbanorgs.org/ "This site supports an informal network of scholars independently doing research on formal organizations and inequality in urban contexts. Topics include gentrification, immigration, amenities, well-being, social networks, non-profit organizations, social capital, organizational density, politics, crime and punishment, housing, community building organizations, and governance." 2010 GRADUATE STUDENT PAPER COMPETITION Congratulations to our winner and runner-up for the 2010 Graduate Student Paper Competition! WINNER Michael Gaddis, University of North Carolina What's in a Relationship? Examining Race, Class, and Contact Time as Determinants of Social Capital in Mentoring Relationships Over the past twenty-five years, social capital has emerged as an important yet highly debated concept in social science research. The current literature leaves researchers to question what characteristics of a relationship are important in producing beneficial outcomes. Conflicting theories highlight the importance of differing relationship characteristics, including the amount of time spent between individuals, social class difference and racial similarity. I argue that the answer is unclear due to the measurement of substantially different concepts as well as a persistent endogeneity problem. I examine data from a quasi-experimental design on mentoring relationships and run estimations using propensity score weighting to address selection bias in estimating causal effects of social capital. The results indicate that the amount of time spent in a relationship has a significant effect on both academic and deviant behavioral outcomes for youths, but this finding is moderated through the racial match of a relationship. Additionally, counter to what some theory suggests, social class difference between individuals has no significant effect on any of the examined outcomes. This paper embodies the essence of community research and development. The paper makes a strong contribution to the literature, and examines academic and behavioral outcomes of at-risk youth in mentoring relationships. A primary strength of the research was its quasi-experimental design. More importantly, the results of this study indicate how social capital can improve the lives of youth in urban, and low-income communities. RUNNER-UP Neal Palmer, Vanderbilt University Social Capital, Migration, and Educational Opportunities in the Urban Chinese Context In China, rapid but geographically uneven development has led to massive migration from rural to urban areas. The hukou residency registration system has traditionally limited the rights of migrant families, and although public education is now technically available, associated fees often lead children to enroll in alternatives, such as private or migrant schools. Using survey data from rural parents who were working in Chinese urban areas as part of the China Ministry of Education's 2006 project, "The Transition of China's Rural Labor to Urban Areas," I use parents' social capital to predict type of school enrollment for migrant children. Results indicate that parents' attachment to their urban community and neighborhood social interaction feature prominently in the ability of children to attend public schools; reliance on neighborhood resources to the exclusion of other support, however, may be associated with attendance at less desirable schools. Implications for labor, migration policy, education, and conceptualizations of social capital in the Chinese context are discussed. ANNOUNCEMENTS Member News: Hortencia Jimenez, Doctoral Candidate at the University of Texas at Austin, has an article forthcoming in Latino Studies entitled "Unidos Por La Justicia and Mujeres Fuertes: Grassroots groups shaping Mexican immigrant women's activism in San Jose, California." She has received a $20,000 dissertation fellowship from the Center for American Studies of the College of Liberal Arts at the University of Texas at Austin and has also been elected as Graduate Student Representative to the Latina/o Section of the American Sociological Association. New Books: Social Problems: A Service Learning Approach (by Corey Dolgon and Chris Baker). Pine Forge Press; $54.95. The research integrates an innovative case study approach into a comprehensive introduction that helps students understand how they can address social problems in their communities by applying basic theories and concepts. More info at: http://www.pineforge.com/textbooksProdDesc.nav?prodId=Book226144. Pioneers of Public Sociology: Thirty Years of Humanity and Society (by Corey Dolgon and Mary Chayko). Sloan Publishing. $32.95. This anthology brings some of the clearest and most important voices on public sociology. While sociology has always been inextricably linked to studying social problems, the rise of public sociology brings solving those problems front and center. This book pairs classic and contemporary articles in this tradition with critical rejoinders - many published in the journal Humanity and Society, some written especially for this book. More info at: http://www.sloanpublishing.com/public_sociology . Leadership in Nonprofit Organizations: A Reference Handbook, (Editor Kathryn Agard.) Sage Publications. $325 -- Leaders of nonprofit organizations deliver programs and services vital to the quality of life in the United States. This two-volume work engages voices on issues and leadership topics important to those seeking to understand more about this dynamic sector of society. There is specific focus on the roles and skills required of the nonprofit leader in voluntary organizations.. More info at: http://atgstg01.sagepub.com/booksProdDesc.nav?prodId=Book233144&currTree=Subjects&level1=600&level2=6G0&level3=6G1& . SSSP 61st ANNUAL MEETING Service Sociology August 12-14, 2011 - Chicago, IL From the statement of A. Javier Trevi–o, SSSP President, Wheaton College: "Service sociology is a sociology of social problems intended to ameliorate conditions of life for those in need of assistance, and to insure and promote the welfare of the community. Motivated by care and compassion a service-oriented sociology is aimed at helping people meet their pressing social needs. As such, service sociology involves the application of sociological knowledge combined with the expression of humanitarian sentiment in neighborly service. " COMMUNITY RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT DIVISION 2011 PAPER SESSIONS Division Sessions Community Problems & Community Organizations Organizer: Felicia Sullivan, University of Massachusetts Boston, felicia.sullivan@umb.edu Service Sociology as Public Sociology/Service In Communities (THEMATIC) Organizer: Onˇsimo (Ness) Sandoval, Saint Louis University, jsandov3@slu.edu Tables in the Round: Research Making a Difference in Communities Organizer: Patrick Donnelly, University of Dayton, Patrick.Donnelly@notes.udayton.edu Co-sponsored Sessions American Metropolis: Poverty & Inequality: Evidence from the 2010 Census Organizer: Shelley McDonough Kimelberg, Northeastern University, s.kimelberg@neu.edu (Division Co-sponsors: Poverty, Class & Inequality, Sociology & Social Welfare) How are Families Coping with Housing Distress in Communities? Organizer: Deirdre Oakley, Georgia State University, socdao@langate.gsu.edu (Division Co-sponsors: Family, Sociology & Social Welfare) Crime & Inequality in Communities Organizer: Andrea Leverentz, University of Massachusetts Boston, Andrea.Leverentz@umb.edu (Division Co-sponsor: Sociology & Social Welfare) Social Reconstruction After Natural and Un-natural Disasters Organizer: Steve Lang, LaGuardia College CUNY, slang@lagcc.cuny.edu (Division Co-sponsors: Environment & Technology, Family, Global) Immigration, Exclusion & Human Rights: Changes in State and Local Policy Organizer: Theo Majka, University of Dayton, Theo.Majka@notes.udayton.edu (Division Co-sponsors: Conflict, Social Action & Change, Global, Law & Society, Racial & Ethnic Minorities) Scholar Activism & Community Health Organizer: Barbara Gurr, University of Connecticut, barbara.gurr@uconn.edu and Sue Bell, Minnesota State University, sue.bell@mnsu.edu (Division Co-sponsor: Health, Health Policy & Health Services) Submission Deadline: January 2011 ABOUT THE COMMUNITY RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT DIVISION: The CRD Division's mission is to provide opportunities for scholars, researchers, students, activists, and others to share and discuss their scholarship and experiences in a supportive setting. In order to further the goal of a just world the Division seeks to integrate the theory, empirical findings, and practice of both scholars/researchers and grassroots activists. Heather MacIndoe, CRD Division Chair, University of Massachusetts, Boston Phone: 617-287-4861 E-Mail: Heather.macindoe@umb.edu Newsletter Editor: Felicia M. Sullivan, University of Massachusetts, Boston We're on the Web! See us at: http://www.sssp1.org