Revealing the Empowerment Revolution: A Literature Review of the Model Cities Program

Abstract

Lauded in its time, Model Cities dominated the final years of the War on Poverty only to be largely forgotten for nearly two decades. In 1966, new legislation led to the implementation of more than 150, five-year long, Model Cities experiments to develop new antipoverty programs and alternative forms of municipal government. Results included a renaissance of minority political leadership. Federal funds supported representatives of economically disadvantaged communities to become more involved in municipal politics; however, a change in the political climate just as these programs were beginning shifted the purpose of Model Cities to bricks and mortar housing and building projects, clouding subsequent analyses of the program. This article reviews related literature from early pieces on planning and implementation in the late 1960s, through a phase of misinterpretation and neglect in the 1980s and 1990s, to a re-emergent interest in Model Cities’ legacy and the phenomenon of citizen participation.