In the Shadow of the Ivory Tower

American higher education is in crisis-costs continue to climb skyward while public funding is in decline. In response, university administrators have aimed to enrich their campuses and the surrounding areas with amenities to attract students and faculty, especially in urban areas where students can explore cities from the safety of the ivory tower. But what, then, becomes of the communities and cultures surrounding these campuses?

In In the Shadow of the Ivory Tower, historian Davarian L. Baldwin argues that urban universities have been key forces behind the gentrification of America's cities; in fact, urban planners have used the profitable high-tech high-density model of the university campus as a blueprint for the city as a whole. As a result, the Black and Latino communities that largely surrounded campuses are left especially vulnerable, at the mercy of skyrocketing property values, discriminatory campus police forces and the need for low-wage high education labor. Universities are treating cities as their company towns, and catering to the whims of students for the sake of profit means that these longstanding communities are bulldozed over, metaphorically and literally. Despite these implications, everyone from New York to Arizona wants to build a UniverCity.

Baldwin takes us on a journey from his own university in Hartford to Chicago, from Phoenix to Manhattan, using these case studies to illustrate the increasingly parasitic relationship between higher education and urban planning. In the Shadow of the Ivory Tower is a wake-up call to the reality that higher education is no longer the ubiquitous public good it was once thought to be, and an urgent call for a more equitable relationship between American cities and universities.

“"One of the nation's foremost urban historians, Davarian Baldwin reveals how these institutions have acquired massive financial and real estate holdings and leveraged them to displace vulnerable communities, control public access to essential services, define progress, and, even, command their own police forces. This brilliant study shows that higher education continues to thrive off the injustices that plague our society." -- Craig Steven Wilder, author of Ebony & Ivy: Race, Slavery and the Troubled History of America's Universities”

"A provocation: a necessary call to give cities and universities pause before they plow ahead with any seemingly righteous real estate project."--Planetizen

"An unflinching and comprehensive look at how capital has reached its talons into every facet of our lives, from the halls of our elite universities to the street corners of our local communities. A must-read for anyone interested in envisioning a more equitable future for education and city life."

--P. E. Moskowitz, author of How To Kill A City

"Baldwin brings his incisive insights and analysis to bear in a devastating critique of our dated and quaint notions of universities and colleges as egalitarian sites of learning and cultural production. He unmasks 'UniverCities' as growth machines, unleashing gentrification, stewarding large police forces, cheating tax coffers while exploiting low wage Black and Brown labor throughout the campus."

--Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, author of Race for Profit: How Banks and the Real Estate Industry Undermined Black Homeownership

"Insightful, compelling, and timely. This book lays the groundwork for the role of universities in creating equitable and just cities."

--Ibram X. Kendi, National Book Award-winning author of Stamped from the Beginning and How to Be an Antiracist

"One of the nation's foremost urban historians, Davarian Baldwin reveals how these institutions have acquired massive financial and real estate holdings and leveraged them to displace vulnerable communities, control public access to essential services, define progress, and, even, command their own police forces. This brilliant study shows that higher education continues to thrive off the injustices that plague our society."

--Craig Steven Wilder, author of Ebony & Ivy: Race, Slavery and the Troubled History of America's Universities
"A cogent analysis of an urban-growth phenomenon that is rarely done well or equitably."--Kirkus Reviews
"A well-informed and highly critical study of higher education's "increasingly powerful hold" over U.S. cities...Combining in-depth research, practicable models of reform (e.g. the University of Winnipeg's sustainable development program), and the lively voices of community organizers and college insiders, Baldwin makes a convincing case. This passionate call to hold universities more accountable resonates."--Publishers Weekly

Davarian L. Baldwin is a leading urbanist, historian, and cultural critic. The Paul E. Raether Distinguished Professor of American Studies and founding director of the Smart Cities Lab at Trinity College, Baldwin is the author of Chicago's New Negroes: Modernity, the Great Migration, and Black Urban Life (UNC, 2007) and co-editor, with Minkah Makalani, of the essay collection Escape From New York! The New Negro Renaissance beyond Harlem (Minnesota, 2013). He has received grants and fellowships from Harvard University, the University of Virginia, the University of Notre Dame, and the Logan Nonfiction Writing Fellowship from the Carey Institute for the Global Good. He lives with his wife and children in Springfield, Massachusetts.

American higher education is in crisis-costs continue to climb skyward while public funding is in decline. In response, university administrators have aimed to enrich their campuses and the surrounding areas with amenities to attract students and faculty, especially in urban areas where students can explore cities from the safety of the ivory tower. But what, then, becomes of the communities and cultures surrounding these campuses? In In the Shadow of the Ivory Tower , historian Davarian L. Baldwin argues that urban universities have been key forces behind the gentrification of America's cities; in fact, urban planners have used the profitable high-tech high-density model of the university campus as a blueprint for the city as a whole. As a result, the Black and Latino communities that largely surrounded campuses are left especially vulnerable, at the mercy of skyrocketing property values, discriminatory campus police forces and the need for low-wage high education labor. Universities are treating cities as their company towns, and catering to the whims of students for the sake of profit means that these longstanding communities are bulldozed over, metaphorically and literally. Despite these implications, everyone from New York to Arizona wants to build a UniverCity. Baldwin takes us on a journey from his own university in Hartford to Chicago, from Phoenix to Manhattan, using these case studies to illustrate the increasingly parasitic relationship between higher education and urban planning. In the Shadow of the Ivory Tower is a wake-up call to the reality that higher education is no longer the ubiquitous public good it was once thought to be, and an urgent call for a more equitable relationship between American cities and universities.

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