COMMUNITY ACTIVISM IN OAK PARK: COMPETING AGENDAS ...

Abstract
of
COMMUNITY ACTIVISM IN OAK PARK:
COMPETING AGENDAS FOR CHANGE IN A GENTRIFYING NEIGHBORHOOD
by
Rose Regina Garcia
Statement of Problem: Through an ethnographic analysis of activism in Oak Park, a
working-class neighborhood of Sacramento, California, this work explores conflict in the
ways different community groups define social change and reveals how different
perspectives on such change and competing strategies of neighborhood improvement help
shape residents’ claims to the city.
Sources of Data: Data were gathered by the author’s participation in community groups
and non-profit organizations in Oak Park and observation of their attempts to improve the
quality of life for residents in the community. The author’s fieldwork was further
substantiated by the use of extensive anthropological and sociological research in print,
as well as a small amount of research from other fields. In addition, the author made use
of historical news articles from the Sacramento Bee as well as the Sacramento News and
Review, a news and entertainment publication.
Conclusions Reached: Efforts to improve the quality of life for residents occur through
revitalization projects, grass-roots projects, labor organizing, and programs of non-profit
agencies. The ethnographic data highlight the ways that community groups are
facilitating social change in the gentrifying neighborhood of Oak Park. Although the
community groups’ agendas for social change are aimed at improving the quality of life
for residents, their efforts are heterogeneous and different strategies to facilitate such
change are fueled by various notions of social change of the middle-class, women, and
activist residents.
Analysis of the data suggests that groups’ efforts to improve the quality of life for
residents in Oak Park are counterproductive and do not improve the quality of life for all
residents, especially the poor. Moreover, the author perceives the occurrence of what are
often referred to as “dilemmas of activism.” While these projects benefit the overall
quality of life for the middle-class and promote a middle-class lifestyle, they in fact
contradict their own objective, which is to improve the quality of life for the poor. Poor
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