The Truly Disadvantaged: The Inner City, the Underclass, and Public Policy

Abstract

:This article analyzes the main issues and arguments contained in The Truly Disadvantaged: The Inner City, the Underclass, and Public Policy, by William J. Wilson (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987) and takes issue with several methodological aspects of the book. Although Wilson’s emphasis on the specific problems of inner city residents is generally insightful and useful, his adherence to a traditional liberal public policy approach limits the practically, applicability, and consistency of many of his themes. A more pluralistic approach may provide a more methodologically fruitful avenue for analyzing the problems of the underclass and the inner city while yielding more effective policy categories such as liberal and conservative, scholars and analysts can better acknowledge the relative roles of both institutional and subjective elements in the urban environment.