Thanks, Patrick, for that provocative reflection on banking and race. I've been thinking a lot about the connections you were musing over, so let me spice the brew before everyone has coffee on Wednesday. BTW, thanks to those who responded privately, and I repeat my interest in hearing from anyone doing new stuff on race/discrimination/banking/housing. Patrick makes several diverse points. I'll crunch through some, and undoubtedly leave others uncrunched. Blame the late hour. First, the point that much radical policy analysis is reactive, not active. In the case of housing/banking, reactive means looking for discrimination per se, hoping to score Fed points; but leaving other connections untouched, or too little touched. I don't agree that the studies have shown discrimination per se; I don't think any have, except for the "paired-testing" types (minority and white person with identical characteristics try to get a loan, get a job, ...). The studies most often replicated have shown that areas with many minority residents -- usually African American population percentage, for most studies -- have lower loan flows per eligible housing unit. This "area" race effect is different than showing "individual" race effects aimed at specific minority applicants. The area race effects show, in Anne Shlay's term, the lack of a "fair share" of credit in those areas -- no more and no less than that. These are the studies that have indeed proliferated around the country. The very volume of these studies is, in a way, impressive -- because lots of activist groups could replicate something done somewhere else, and borrow ideas on how to interpret it. But here's where things have tilted in a way that Patrick doesn't like. Conservative critics responded, "How do you know it's not lack of demand for housing loans in minority areas?" In response, HMDA data on individual applicants were produced thanks to a compromise worked out by the Southern Finance Project and others during the FIRREA negotations. This richer data allowed richer tests on whether in fact there were still fewer loans to minorities once you took applica- tions into account. The answer was, yes; but the conservative rejoinder was again, "How do you know it isn't bad credit history ...? (etc.)?" In efect, there's always an excluded variable problem to contend with. Even the infamous revised Boston study didn't quell the pens of the conservative scribes at the WSJ. The revised Beantown tried to put everything and the kitchen sink into the structural equation; but still there was a flaw -- "What about default rates?" It would take us too far afield to follow this strange debate further here. The point is that a good part of the empirics has definitely involved a dialogue with "conservative" economists; and this has been fought out on terrain these foes understand ... and the empirics have (surprise) proven to be inconclusive. I would vote for continuing that dialogue/duel, but also as Patrick suggests, for mounting new campaigns on new fronts. Here, I'll just throw out a few things, since I've gone on too long. Area race effects can be the legacy of structural discrimination, not just of racist bankers. And structural discrimination can be an amalgam of labor-market inequity, class dynamics, unequal wealth, etc. I have a paper coming out later this year in the Rev. of Black Pol. Economy, which shows how labor-market and credit-market discrimination can interact very perversely. I think that the class and race dynamics are interpenetrating; so I see efforts that are class-based as being complementary with "race" based efforts. I agree completely with the need to look at spatial dimensions. More and more I think this is a key. The racial, of course, is spatial. This is just where we need to add in, say, Robert Bullard and Melvin Oliver, to spice William J. Wilson. The racial is also gendered, as is the class- based. The post-moderns here would say, no problem, find a specific instance and pull it apart. I've don precisely this with my own co-work -- with John Veitch -- on LA. The class/gender/racial separations that are going on, the polarizing processes, interweave, and leave us more and more with very different kinds of space. I don't think I agree with Lash and Urry that it's "ungovernable" -- but it's definitely polarized, and I think polarized in ways richer than can be got at with just one dimension alone. I also like the idea of combining ideas about financial fragility and speculation with ideas about localized credit rationing. Here too there's a lot to be said -- but another time ? And as to literature. The old radical stuff from the 1970's has a lot to say today. Some is a bit functionalist for my taste; but still lots of insights that should be thrown back into circulation. I'd also note that I've been learning a lot from the geographers and sociologists. There's some interesting work on "financial exclusion" coming out that's worth a second look. For those interested in such trends, a new "Los Angeles" school is arising -- with Ed Soja, Mike Davis, Allen Scott, Jennifer Wolch, Michael Dear at the center -- in response to the older "Chicago model". Hey, we're just jealous about MJ coming back. Why not Magic? Sorry for the length. Thanks again.
