The author evaluates urban regime theory as an approach to understanding development and housing policy in New York City since the 1970s. Strong elements of policy continuity are explained by the impact of economic restructuring, federal retrenchment, and interest-group pressures. The relatively modest shifts in policy that did take place are related to changes in the local real estate market and community mobilization as well as to the political factors highlighted by a regime framework. Regime theory's emphasis on political leadership, coalition building, and policy form, at the expense of other factors of urban analysis, underestimates the obstacles to genuinely progressive, community-oriented urban development.
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