Visions of Public Space: Reproducing and Resisting Social Hierarchies in a Community Garden

Urban Farm DB summary

This 2015 ethnographic study, conducted between 2011 and 2013 in a diverse and gentrifying New York City neighborhood, analyzed conflicts within a community garden. It found that disputes among gardeners over aesthetics and conduct reproduced broader gentrification struggles, with privileged gardeners leveraging resources to impose their vision. However, less privileged gardeners, through cross-class and cross-racial relationships, were able to destabilize hierarchies and defend their alternative visions for the public space.