The Right to Suburbia Combating Gentrification on the Urban Edge

In recent decades, American suburbs have undergone a so-called renaissance as multiple forces have transformed them into denser urban landscapes. At the same time, suburban racial diversity, immigration, and poverty rates have surged. The Right to Suburbia investigates how marginalized communities in the suburbs of Washington, DC—one of the most intensely gentrifying metropolitan regions in the United States—have combatted the uneven costs and benefits of redevelopment.

Lung-Amam narrates the efforts of activists, community groups, and political leaders fighting for communities' right to stay put and benefit from new neighborhood investments. Revealing the far-reaching impacts of state-led redevelopment, she shows how patterns of unequal, racialized development and displacement are being produced and reproduced in suburbs—and how communities are fighting back.