The Symbolic Dilemmas of Suburban Poverty: Challenges and Opportunities Posed by Variations in the Contours of Suburban Poverty

Poverty has increased significantly in U. S. suburbs since the 1990s. What we know about suburban poverty is largely limited to demographic and economic information. Building off the organizational perspective approach, I use in-depth interviews with nonprofit, antipoverty organizations in eight Pen...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Sociological forum (Randolph, N.J.) N.J.), 2010-09, Vol.25 (3), p.541-569
Main Author: Murphy, Alexandra K.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Churches
Cities
Community associations
competition for resources
Decision Making
Demography
Fundraising
Housing
Neighborhoods
Nonprofit organizations
Pennsylvania
Political Systems
Politics
Poverty
social policy
Social problems and social policy. Social work
Social structure
Sociology
Suburban areas
Suburbs
symbolic dilemmas
Typology
U.S.A
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Summary:Poverty has increased significantly in U. S. suburbs since the 1990s. What we know about suburban poverty is largely limited to demographic and economic information. Building off the organizational perspective approach, I use in-depth interviews with nonprofit, antipoverty organizations in eight Pennsylvania suburbs to better understand the suburban poverty experience. My focus is on how organizations compete for external resources. By working directly with the poverty problem while also working in broader metropolitan political and economic fields of decision making, this "middleman" role (Marwell, 2007) gives us insights into contemporary poverty dynamics for suburbs. I find that how suburban organizational leaders perceive the challenges they face, and what strategies they adopt to confront such difficulties, revolves around symbolic dilemmas posed by the history, distribution, and politics of poverty in the suburbs. Symbolic dilemmas cluster around three different situational contexts of poverty in the suburbs. I use this to develop a three-part typology of suburban poverty: symbiotic suburbs, skeletal suburbs, and overshadowed suburbs. This typology has implications for future research and for policymakers interested in developing tools to appropriately address this pressing issue.
ISSN:0884-8971
1573-7861
DOI:10.1111/j.1573-7861.2010.01195.x