Sayre and Kaufman Revisited
- 1 December 1979
- journal article
- Published by SAGE Publications in Urban Affairs Quarterly
- Vol. 15 (2) , 123-145
- https://doi.org/10.1177/107808747901500201
Abstract
In 1965, Sayre and Kaufman concluded their introduction to Governing New York City with the following question: "What other large American city is as democratically and as well-governed?" This article seeks to explain the apparent failure of the government of New York City in the post-1965 period and suggests that the pluralists' model of city government identified by Sayre and Kaufman failed due to the highly disaggregative fashion in which the primary resources of government-financial, manpower, and legal- were disposed in the post-1965 period. The article further suggests that, following the onset of the city's fiscal crisis in 1975, a transformation in the political process of the city from an extremely fragmented, pluralistic structure to a coalition of key groups united by a common aversion to bankruptcy may have begun. The author concludes with a critique of pluralism, a challenge to its critics, and questions whether a previous decade of "Who Governs Research" has much relevance to what has transpired in New York City.Keywords
This publication has 2 references indexed in Scilit:
- Power in the CityPublished by University of California Press ,1974
- Two Faces of PowerAmerican Political Science Review, 1962