NCJ Number
148491
Date Published
1967
Length
192 pages
Annotation
This study examines the meaning for alienated youth of three significant socioeconomic developments in the 1960's: the burgeoning of the civil rights movements, the Anti- Poverty Program, and the riots in several cities; recommendations are designed to resolve or diminish the problems of alienated youth in the context of these three developments.
Abstract
The study is based primarily on interviews with experts who have worked with youth, including staff members of street-work agencies; officials of human relations commissions; police; educators; and staff members of various local poverty programs, community planning councils, and Federal agencies. Nine cities were visited for the study: Boston, Chicago, Cleveland, Detroit, Los Angeles, New York, Philadelphia, Rochester, and Washington, D.C. The first chapter identifies a seeming paradox: expanded opportunities for minorities and poor people and riots in many cities by these same groups. This paradox is explained by the persistence of inner-city ghettos, with their intense concentration of people, poverty, and miserable living conditions. In every ghetto, unemployment is high, incomes are low, the percentage on public welfare is high, schools are segregated and poor, and educational achievement is low. Those who do manage to obtain education, jobs, and higher incomes tend to move from the ghetto to communities with better housing, leaving the ghettos to individuals and families with low incomes. Riots are an expression of the frustration, rage, and hopelessness of those who live in poverty without hope that their lives will change. If riots have any strategic benefit for rioters, it is that they make the rest of society, which is far removed from ghetto life, aware of the feelings and rage of ghetto residents, youth in particular. This study analyzes the riots of the mid-1960's, the role of alienated youth in these riots, and community reactions. Another chapter examines the participation of alienated youth in civil rights activities, followed by a chapter on Anti-Poverty Programs and their impact on ghettos. The dynamics of race and nationality of ghetto residents and their perceptions of discrimination against them by those who live outside the ghetto are discussed in another chapter. The second major section of the book discusses what needs to be done. Two chapters focus on strategies for change that increase opportunities for racial minorities and ways to decrease poverty and improve living conditions in inner cities. 81-item bibliography and the interview questionnaire