In 1994, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development launched the Moving to Opportunity for Fair Housing Demonstration Program (MTO), a lottery that offered poor families vouchers to move out of public housing into private apartments. Drawing on recently collected vote history data, this study reveals that MTO has had the unintended consequence of reducing voter turnout among participating adults. The low turnout may be due to the loss of social ties that accompanied mobility. The findings suggest that residential mobility, a popular tool in the fight against poverty, may strain poor Americans’ weak ties to the political system.
Alex-AssensohYvette M.1998. Neighborhoods, family, and political behavior in urban America. New York, NY: Garland.
2.
Alex-AssensohYvetteAssensohA. B.2001. Inner-city contexts, church attendance, and African-American political participation. Journal of Politics63 (3): 886-901.
3.
BerryJeffrey M.PortneyKent E.ThomsonKen. 1991. The political behavior of poor people. In The urban underclass, edited by JencksChristopherPetersonPaul E., 357-72. Washington, DC: Brookings Institution.
4.
BloomHoward S.1984. Accounting for no-shows in experimental evaluation designs. Evaluation Review8 (2): 225-46.
5.
BradyHenry E.McNultyJohn E.2004. The costs of voting: Evidence from a natural experiment. Presented at Annual Meeting of the Society for Political Methodology, Palo Alto, CA.
6.
BriggsXavier de SouzaTurnerMargery A.2006. Assisted housing mobility and the success of low-income minority families: Lessons for policy, practice, and future research. Northwestern Journal of Law and Social Policy1 (1): 25-61.
7.
Clampet-LundquistSusan. 2004. Hope VI relocation: Moving to new neighborhoods and building new ties. Housing Policy Debate15 (2): 415-47.
8.
CohenCathyDawsonMichael. 1993. Neighborhood poverty and African-American politics. American Political Science Review87 (2): 286-302.
9.
ComeyJenniferBriggsXavier de SouzaWeismannGretchen. 2008. Struggling to Stay Out of High-Poverty Neighborhoods: Lessons from the Moving to Opportunity Experiment. In Three-City Study of Moving to Opportunity. Brief 6. Washington, DC: The Urban Institute.
10.
CurleyAlexandra M.2009. Draining or gaining? The social networks of public housing movers in Boston. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships26 (2-3): 227-47.
Garshick KleitRachel. 2010. Draining ties: Tie quality versus content in low-income women’s social networks when displaced by redevelopment. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships27 (4): 573-88.
13.
GilesMichael W.DanticoMarilyn. 1982. Political participation and neighborhood social context revisited. American Journal of Political Science26 (1): 144-50.
14.
FowlerJames H.2005. Turnout in a small world. In The social logic of politics: Personal networks as context for political behavior, edited by ZuckermanAlan S., 269-87. Philadelphia, PA: Temple Univ. Press.
15.
HarrisFrederick. 1999. Something within: Religion in African-American political activism. New York: Oxford Univ. Press.
16.
HightonBenjamin. 2000. Residential mobility, community mobility and electoral participation. Political Behavior22 (2): 109-20.
17.
HightonBenjaminWolfingerRaymond E.1998. Estimating the effects of the National Voter Registration Act of 1993. Political Behavior20 (2): 79-104.
18.
HolderKelly. 2006. Voting and registration in the election of November 2004. In Current Population Reports P20-556. Washington, DC: U.S. Census Bureau.
19.
HonakerJamesKingGaryBlackwellMatthew. 2007. Amelia II: A program for missing data.
20.
HuckfeldtRobert R.1979. Political participation and the neighborhood social context. American Journal of Political Science23 (3): 579-92.
21.
HuckfeldtRobertSpragueJohn. 1987. Networks in context: The social flow of political information. American Political Science Review81 (4): 1197-216.
22.
HuckfeldtRobertSpragueJohn. 1995. Citizens, politics and social communication. New York: Cambridge Univ. Press.
23.
JargowskyPaul A.1997. Poverty and place: Ghettos, barrios, and the American city. New York: Russell Sage Foundation.
24.
JencksChristopherMayerSusan. 1990. The social consequences of growing up in a poor neighborhood. In Inner-city poverty in the United States, edited by LynnLaurenceMcGearyMichael, 111-86. Washington, DC: National Academy Press.
25.
KatzLawrenceKlingJeffereyLiebmanJeffrey. 2001. Moving to opportunity in Boston: Early results of a randomized mobility experiment. Quarterly Journal of Economics116 (2): 607-54.
26.
KeelsMicereDuncanGreg J.DeLucaStephanieMendenhallRubyRosenbaumJames. 2005. Fifteen years later: Can residential mobility programs provide a long-term escape from neighborhood segregation, crime, and poverty?Demography42 (1): 51-73.
27.
KennyChristopher B.1992. Political participation and effects from the social environment. American Journal of Political Science36 (1): 259-67.
28.
KingGaryHonakerJamesJosephAnneScheveKenneth. 2001. Analyzing incomplete political science data: An alternative algorithm for multiple imputation. American Political Science Review95 (1): 49-69.
29.
KingsleyG. ThomasPettitKathryn L. S.2003. Concentrated poverty: A change in course. In Neighborhood change in urban America. Brief 2. Washington, DC: Urban Institute.
30.
KingsleyThomasPettitKathryn L. S.2008. Have MTO families lost access to opportunity neighborhoods over time? In Three-city study of moving to opportunity. Brief 2. Washington, DC: The Urban Institute.
KlingJeffreyLudwigJensKatzLawrence. 2005. Neighborhood effects on crime for female and male youth: Evidence from a randomized housing voucher experiment. Quarterly Journal of Economics120 (1): 87-130.
33.
KnackStephen. 1992. Civic norms, social sanctions, and voter turnout. Rationality and Society4 (2): 133-56.
34.
KnackStephenKropfMartha E.1998. For Shame! The effect of community cooperative context on probability of voting. Political Psychology19 (3): 585-99.
35.
KnackStephenWhiteJames. 2000. Election-day registration and turnout inequality. Political Behavior22 (1): 29-44.
36.
KnokeDavid. 1990. Networks of political action: Toward theory construction. Social Forces68 (4):1041-63.
37.
LakeRonald La DueHuckfeldtRobert. 1998. Social capital, social networks, and political participation. Political Psychology19 (3): 567-84.
38.
LeighleyJan E.1990. Social interaction and contextual influences on political participation. American Politics Quarterly18 (4):459-75.
39.
LeventhalTamaBrooks-GunnJeanne. 2003. Moving to opportunity: An experimental study of neighborhood effects on mental health. American Journal of Public Health93 (9): 1576-82.
40.
LudwigJensDuncanGregHirschfieldPaul. 2001. Urban poverty and juvenile crime: Evidence from a randomized housing-mobility experiment. Quarterly Journal of Economics116 (2): 655-79.
41.
LudwigJensLiebmanJeffrey B.KlingJeffrey R.DuncanGreg J.KatzLawrence F.KesslerRonald C.SanbonmatsuLisa. 2008. What can we learn about neighborhood effects from the moving to opportunity experiment?American Journal of Sociology114 (1): 144-88.
42.
MarschallMelissa. 2001. Does the shoe fit?: Testing models of participation for African-American and Latino involvement in local politics. Urban Affairs Review37 (2): 227-48.
43.
MarschallMelissaStolleDietlind. 2004. Race and the city: Neighborhood context and the development of generalized trust. Political Behavior26 (2): 125-53.
44.
McClurgScott D.2003. Social networks and political participation: The role of social interaction in explaining political participation. Political Research Quarterly56 (4):449-64.
45.
McNultyJohnDowlingConorAriottiMargaret H.2009. Driving saints to sin: How increasing the difficulty of voting dissuades even the most motivated voters. Political Analysis17 (4): 435-55.
46.
McPhersonMillerSmith-LovinLynnCookJames M.2001. Birds of a feather: Homophily in social networks. Annual Review of Sociology27:415-44.
47.
McRobertsOmar. 2004. Streets of glory: Church and community in a Black urban neighborhood. Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press.
48.
MendenhallRubyDeLucaStefanieDuncanGreg. 2006. Neighborhood resources, racial segregation and economic mobility: Results from the Gautreaux program. Social Science Research35 (4): 892-923.
49.
MutzDiana C.2002. The consequences of cross-cutting networks for political participation. American Journal of Political Science46 (4): 838-55.
50.
OrrLarryFeinsJudithJacobRobinBeecroftErikSanbonmatsuLisaKatzLawrenceLiebmanJeffereyKlingJeffrey. 2003. Moving to Opportunity for Fair Housing Demonstration Program: Interim impacts evaluation. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.
51.
PlutzerEricWiefekNancy. 2006. Family transitions, economic status, and voter turnout among African-American inner-city women. Social Science Quarterly87 (3): 658-78.
52.
PopkinSusan. 2007. Testimony before U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Housing, Transportation, and Community Development. Hearing on S.829: HOPE VI Improvement and Reauthorization Act.
53.
PopkinSusan. 2008. New findings on the benefits and limitations of assisted housing mobility. Washington, DC: Urban Institute.
54.
PopkinSusanKatzBruceCunninghamMaryBrownKarenGustafsonJeremyTurnerMargery. 2004. A decade of HOPE VI: Research findings and policy challenges. Washington DC: Urban Institute.
55.
PopkinSusanLeventhalTamaWeismannGretchen. 2008. Girls in the ‘hood: The importance of feeling safe. Washington, DC: The Urban Institute.
56.
PutnamRobert D.2000. Bowling alone. New York: Simon and Schuster.
57.
RosenstoneSteven J.HansenJohn Mark. 1993. Mobilization, participation, and democracy in America. New York: Macmillan.
58.
RubinowitzLeonard S.RosenbaumJames E.2000. Crossing the class and color lines: From public housing to White suburbia. Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press.
59.
SampsonRobert J.2008. Moving to inequality: Neighborhood effects and experiments meet social structure. American Journal of Sociology114 (1): 189-231.
60.
SampsonRobert J.MorenoffJeffrey D.Gannon-RowleyThomas. 2002. Assessing “neighborhood effects”: Social processes and new directions in research. Annual Review of Sociology28:443-78.
61.
SchaferJoseph L.OlsenMaren K.1998. Multiple imputation for multivariate missing-data problems: A data analyst’s perspective. Multivariate Behavioral Research33 (4): 545-71.
62.
SquirePeverillWolfingerRaymond E.GlassDavid P.1987. Residential mobility and voter turnout. American Political Science Review81 (1): 45-66.
63.
TomzMichaelWittenbergJasonKingGary. 2001. CLARIFY: Software for interpreting and presenting statistical results. Version 2.0. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Univ. Press.
VenkateshSudhir AlladiCelimliIsilMillerDouglasMurphyAlexandraTurnerBeauty. 2004. Chicago public housing transformation: A research report. New York: Columbia Univ., Center for Urban Research and Policy.
66.
VerbaSidneySchlozmanKay LehmanBradyHenry E.1995. Voice and equality: Civic voluntarism in American politics. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Univ. Press.
67.
WilsonWilliam J.1987. The truly disadvantaged: The inner city, the underclass, and public policy. Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press.
68.
WolfingerRaymond E.HoffmanJonathan. 2001. Registering and voting with Motor Voter. PS: Political Science and Politics34 (1): 85-92.
69.
WolfingerRaymond E.RosenstoneSteven. 1980. Who votes?New Haven: Yale Univ. Press.
