White neighborhoods needed outside elite intervention to preserve segregation, exposing hollow appeals to community.

Evidence

In the eyes of city officials at the decade’s end, Adamsville was a success story. The neighborhood had weathered countless crises—the dissent of white residents near its eastern boundary, the threat of transition on its northern boundary, the exhausting process of organizing residents, the financial strain of repurchasing homes, and even an occasional outbreak of violence. In spite of all this, the WSMDC noted approvingly that “community integrity” had been maintained. That verdict, however, was somewhat disingenuous. To be sure, Adamsville stood, for the time at least, as an all-white residential area. But that was not the same as a “community.” Whites in the region had been unable to hold the neighborhood together on their own and had, in fact, begun to turn against each other when racial residential change loomed large. It was only because of the constant and concerted effort of the city’s moderate political, social, and business forces that Adamsville had maintained its segregated status. The neighborhood had staved off racial succession, but it was at heart a hollow victory, one that offered no proof of any “community spirit” at all. — Kevin M. Kruse, White Flight, 201

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Neighborhoods isolated from city and white support could not sustain segregation — Kevin M. Kruse, White Flight: Atlanta and the Making of…, 222; White homeowners performed community solidarity as a defensive strategy against desegregation — Kevin M. Kruse, White Flight: Atlanta and the Making of…, 190; Whites anchored neighborhood defense to public amenities like parks and schools — Kevin M. Kruse, White Flight: Atlanta and the Making of…, 165 (+4 more)

Broader Connections

• Whites anchored neighborhood defense to public amenities like parks and schools #expands (0.85) — Kevin M. Kruse, White Flight, 165
• Neighborhoods isolated from city and white support could not sustain segregation #corroborates (0.82) — Kevin M. Kruse, White Flight, 222
• White segregationists rhetorically reframed racial exclusion as protection of community integrity #expands (0.82) — Kevin M. Kruse, White Flight, 193
• Segregationist neighborhood defense was rhetorically recast as apolitical community preservation with race unspoken #expands (0.80) — Kevin M. Kruse, White Flight, 194
• Racist ideologies often originate outside the white elite and are organic to nonelite communities #expands (0.78) — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 3619
• White homeowners performed community solidarity as a defensive strategy against desegregation #qualifies (0.76) — Kevin M. Kruse, White Flight, 190
• Whites redefined neighborhood worth as racial homogeneity plus amenity self-sufficiency #expands (0.74) — Kevin M. Kruse, White Flight, 187