Document Type
Article
Publication Date
2000
Abstract
The title for this year’s program of the Section on Urban, State and Local Government Law of the Association of American Law Schools is The City in the 21st Century. These three articles provide a stimulating introduction to three issues that are likely to be central to the study of the city in the twenty-first century-as they were in the twentieth century and in the nineteenth century: the interplay of local and regional forces in land development, the battles among interest groups to control city hall, and the role of local government in promoting local economic development. These issues are frequently interconnected. Land use and economic development are usually the focal points of local political struggles, while the outcomes of local power struggles can affect land use and economic activity in ways unanticipated by local political actors. These issues also represent different facets of the difficult pursuit of the local public interest. As each author notes, private interests play important roles in the processes and products of local governance. Each understands the power of interest groups in local decision making and the fragility of the very notion of the local public interest. Yet, each also continues to look for ways of enhancing the possibilities for public-regarding local outcomes.
Disciplines
Land Use Law | Law | State and Local Government Law
Recommended Citation
Richard Briffault,
Three Issues for the City in the 21st Century,
32
Urb. Law.
409
(2000).
Available at:
https://scholarship.law.columbia.edu/faculty_scholarship/4212
Comments
©2000 by the American Bar Association. Reprinted with permission. All rights reserved. This information or any portion thereof may not be copied or disseminated in any form or by any means or stored in an electronic database or retrieval system without the express written consent of the American Bar Association.