New Deal ruins: race, economic justice, and public housing policy

Public housing was an integral part of the New Deal, as the federal government funded public works to generate economic activity and offer material support to families made destitute by the Great Depression, and it remained a major element of urban policy in subsequent decades.

As chronicled in this book, however, housing policy since the 1990s has turned to the demolition of public housing in favour of subsidized units in mixed-income communities and the use of tenant-based vouchers rather than direct housing subsidies.