White Flight Book Review

Popular Culture in the Age of White Flight: Fear and Fantasy in Suburban Los Angeles by Eric Avila is an informative and thoughtful history of post-WWII Los Angeles that deals specifically with suburbanization and “white flight” in Southern California. “This book acknowledges the unique aspects of Southern California’s growth while recognizing how such growth was linked to a larger set of developments that fundamentally altered the historic balance among cities and regions within the United States after World War II.” (xiv) Specifically, Avila uses the history of Los Angeles to discuss how ‘chocolate cites’ led to the formation of ‘vanilla suburbs,’ which in turn exercised social and political control over the chocolate cities in the form of urban renewal policies.
Early LA was thought to be a “ghetto-less paradise” by Caucasians and African Americans alike. Once known as the “White City,” LA experienced an influx of immigrants and racial minorities who were drawn by the demand for labor in a new war society. “Within the span of two years during the early 1940s, Los Angeles confronted a new racial landscape that shattered earlier idealizations of the city as the seaport of Iowa or the westernmost outpost of Aryan supremacy.” (32)
Unable to accommodate the new population because of a lack of public housing and other “socialistic” programs, LA saw an increase in “congestion, crime, pollution, anonymity, promiscuity, and diversity.” (xv) These problems, collectively known as urban decay, were then dramatized and sensationalized by Hollywood’s new film noir and science fiction genres (e.g. War of the Worlds (1953), Double Indemnity (1944)).
For these and other reasons, LA’s Caucasian population underwent a mass exodus to newly formed suburbs, such as Lakewood, where they could “exercise their preference for a landscape that epitomized homogeneity, containment, and predictability, one that marked a safe contrast to the heterosocial, unpredictable, and often dangerous cultural experiences of industrial urbanism.” (6) These new communities stood in stark contrast to those like Watts and Bunker Hill, which were thought to epitomize urban decay.
While the suburbs provided safe and ordered spaces for the white population, they were also socially isolating, an effect that was exacerbated by the newly created freeways. “White flight did not extinguish the traditions, values, and practices of distinctive Euro-American cultures, but it privatized them, secluding them within the detached and cellular spaces of the suburban landscape.” (16)
The new communities needed a “’town square’ for the suburban metropolis,” (175) a role that was ultimately filled by new private institutions such as Disneyland and Dodger Stadium. “Disneyland and Dodger stadium invited commuters to pause in their rush between home and work to revel in a semblance of community tailored to the social values that informed the region’s dawning political culture.” (223) Both of these institutions catered to vanilla suburbs’ moralities and values; Disneyland by reinforcing the “suburban nuclear family and the centrality of the single-family home,” (138) and Dodger Stadium through its “‘literal enactment’ of killing the ‘slum tradition,’” (146) specifically a Latino community called Chavez Ravine. These institutions ultimately became part of the ‘urban renewal’ policies that championed capitalism and privatization.
While this book could get a little repetitive at times, I thought it was very well argued and well structured. I appreciated how Avila provided background for each new topic and grounded it in the larger history and cultural trends of the nation. Most of all, I enjoyed learning about the history of my ‘home away from home,’ since it is obviously a unique place with an equally unique and fascinating history.