From: rich@pencil.cs.missouri.edu (Rich Winkel)
Subject: Linking Militarization & Urban Plight in Los Angeles
Followup-To: alt.activism.d
Originator: rich@pencil.cs.missouri.edu
Organization: PACH
Distribution: na
Date: Fri, 21 Aug 1992 08:23:14 GMT

POSITIVE ALTERNATIVES
A Publication of the CENTER FOR ECONOMIC CONVERSION

Published quarterly. Materials in POSITIVE ALTERNATIVES may be 
reprinted if this publication and the CENTER for ECONOMIC CONVERSION are 
credited and a copy is sent to CEC.

** Written  4:46 pm  Aug 10, 1992 by dwalt in cdp:econconversion **
THE BELLY OF THE BEAST:
Linking Militarization & Urban Plight in Los Angeles
by Cynthia Hamilton

Between 1976 and 1986 there were austerity protests in over eighty cites 
around the world. On April 30 , Los Angeles joined this list of cities. While 
the conditions of austerity around the globe have been imposed largely by 
the International Monetary Fund in exchange for loans, in Los Angeles 
similar austerity measures have resulted in a reduction of all public 
spending, the elimination of public subsidies (for things like housing and 
health care), and wage restraints. These measures have been imposed by 
an administration anxious to solve its economic problems at the expense 
of the poor. 

President Bush's initial budget for a "kinder, gentler, America" in 1988/89 
slashed $21 billion in domestic spending (while giving military programs 
an inflation increase), including health programs for the Special 
Supplement Food Program for Women, Infants, and Children, and 
appropriation for funds to operate the nation's public housing projects. 
According to the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities, "the budget is 
likely to widen the gap between the wealthy and the poor and the gap 
between the wealthy and the middle class."

Public Dollars For Private Growth
     There is no more obvious example of the widening divide which 
domestic economic policy has produced  than we find in Los Angels. While 
billions in national domestic spending were being cut, Los Angeles County 
firms (1,284 of them) received (FY 90) 4,184 Department of Defense 
Contracts worth $8.9 billion; ten firms received 80% of the money.

This disproportionate distribution is augmented when we look at the way 
anti poverty funds, largely block grant funds (administrated through the 
Community Development Department) are awarded. For years, funds have 
been disproportionately awarded to areas with low poverty levels, like 
West Los Angeles, while areas like South/Central L.A. receive the lowest 
allocation per person in poverty of all six administrative districts. Only 
23% of all requests for funding from South Central are approved. 
(Curran,1988)

When analysts ask what happened in Los Angeles, these are the essential 
realities which must be addressed. Yet the media has said nothing of the 
19.5% Black unemployment rate nor has anyone acknowledged that L.A. has 
a black poverty rate higher than the nation (15.6%); no one mentions that 
in Los Angeles 75% of the families living below poverty pay one half of 
their income for rent or that 14% of those with full time jobs live in 
poverty because of low wages (17.5% of the jobs in the city are low wage 
jobs, paying $11,000 per or less per year).

Ironically, California, the home of the nation's anti public spending 
ideology has been and remains the recipient of the government's greatest 
spending. According to Edward Soja of the UCLA Graduate School of 
Architecture and Urban Planning:        
        
        South California has been by far the largest recipient of prime 
        defense contracts since the 1940s. The continued expansion of
        high technology industries in the 1980s has been promoted still
        further by the military centered Keynesianism of the Reagan
        Administration, with L.A. County in particular being one of
        the leading beneficiaries of research funding for Star
        Wars. . ." (Soja, 1989)

The military dependency of the region has made it very vulnerable to any 
decrease in defense spending. In addition, the impact of layoffs has 
disproportionately impacted minorities; already minorities make up 53% 
of laid off aerospace workers (Economic Roundtable, 1992), even though 
minorities are far less than half of the aerospace workforce.

An Increasingly Polarized Workforce
     Aerospace has long been the focus of the high tech industrial complex, 
which includes civilian aircraft production, advanced electronics, space 
exploration, weapons research and defense contracting.  As old blue collar 
industries declined in Los Angeles, high tech boomed and with this 
dramatic shift and restructuring the polarization in the labor force and 
society was solidified. 

The areas in the West San Fernando Valley and Orange County, home to 
electronic components plants, have grown while the largest number of 
plant closing (old manufacturing like auto, steel, and rubber) were in the 
inner city and surrounding working class suburbs. Incidentally, these areas 
were the home of the largest sector of the Black population as well.

These developments are not new. Industry began moving to the City's 
periphery after World War II. As jobs moved so too did the white 
population, to better housing and better services, leaving inner city 
residents vulnerable to unemployment and its accompanying economic 
disaster.

The Black population's initial immigration to the West Coast was 
precipitated by war production on the assembly lines at the shipyards and 
aircraft plants, but since then there has been little to sustain the 
community. Blacks had to fight the racism and sexism in the aerospace 
industry even in a time of labor shortage. Black women were the first to 
challenge the racism of the Southland when they marched for jobs in the 
aerospace industry during World War II. They insisted that while "our boys 
are good enough to fight for the protection of our country against 
invaders, we the mothers and wives of these soldiers are sick and tired of 
having our right to earn a decent living invaded." (Hamilton, 1988/89)

Nationally, Blacks have made greater employment gains in the public 
sector than in  the private sector. The California economy spurred 
development of highways, freeways and infrastructure as well as 
subsidized agriculture. This has allowed the private sector to grow at the 
public's expense. Public dollars are used to "prepare" investment 
opportunities. The location of corporations outside the inner city was also 
facilitated by government subsidies (in housing, highways and 
infrastructure development). All of these factors contributed to the 
underdevelopment of the Black community in Southern California.

Subsidizing the Defense Beast While Gutting Social Policy
     Any discussion of public policy must begin with an obvious irony, 
"modern capitalism has become progressively more deeply and intricately 
dependent on state policies." (Piven,1987:94) However, while corporate 
development experiences this "dependency" critics of domestic social 
programs rail against the dependency of the poor, of women, minorities, 
and workers. It is perhaps not ironic that defense contractors are among 
the biggest contributors funding Governor Wilson's current  ballot  
initiative  to cut welfare, while most of these  contractors have been on 
the government dole for years.   

Government and corporate managers trumpet the virtues of the market as 
the final arbiter of progress and development; the market  they say, should 
be left unencumbered by social welfare, workers'  insurance, and all other 
such "interventions." While citizens are warned against dependency, 
corporations are free to pursue government support and financial 
guarantees. Policies have been designed to aid corporate profits by 
maintaining consumption and a low wage workforce. These policies have 
been designed to assist growth, not eliminate poverty. It is inevitable that 
these policies would underlie growing inequality and contradictions in  
society.

The public sector has the potential for promoting equality. But instead we 
find the California economy moving in the opposite direction. The 
draconian cuts in all social expenditures, particularly in education ($2.3 
billion in cuts anticipated) will have long term consequences for the state 
but particularly for youth and minorities, including the large numbers 
employed by this sector. Current social policy is pushing many beyond the 
limit of tolerance, hence the events in Los Angeles. Our social policies are 
exacerbating  the inequality caused by our economic policies. As the 
underclass grows and as more people are pushed from the middle class, 
demands will increase. Also, while tax payers are forced  to fuel a costly 
and beastly defense budget, opportunity for substantial economic recovery 
is stifled. It is time that we redirect the massive contracts awarded to 
develop weapons of destruction to develop a peace economy which offers 
opportunity and a better quality of life for all residents of the state.

     CYNTHIA HAMILTON, PhD, is Associate Professor of Pan-African 
Studies at California State University in Los Angeles.

REFERENCES:
Curran, Ron,  "The Mayor and the White Power Structure." LOS ANGELES 
WEEKLY, December 10, 11 (4), 8-11, 1988.
Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.  "The Bush Budget:  Progress 
Toward a Kinder, Gentler America?" Washington D.C., February 17,  1989.
Economic Roundtable. "Los Angeles County Economic Adjustment Strategy 
for Defense reduction in  Los Angeles." L.A., 1992.
Hamilton, Cynthia,. "The Making of an American Bantustan." LOS ANGELES 
WEEKLY. December 10, 11 (4), 32-40, 1988.
Piven, Frances, Barbara Ehrenreich, Richard Cloward, Fred Block, THE MEAN 
SEASON, THE ATTACK ON THE WELFARE STATE. New York: Pantheon Books, 
1987.
Soja, Edward,  POSTMODERN GEOGRAPHIES. New York: Verso, 1989.

** End of text from cdp:econconversion **

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                     THE CENTER FOR ECONOMIC CONVERSION
                222 View St., Suite C, Mountain View CA 94041
                  Tel: (415) 968-8798    FAX: (415) 968-1126
                          Email: bdelson@igc.org
The CENTER for ECONOMIC CONVERSION is a non-profit public benefit 
corporation dedicated to building a sustainable peace-oriented economy. 
Founded in 1975, the organization serves as a national resource center and 
a catalyst for conversion planning. CEC provides educational materials; 
speakers; organizing assistance to conversion activists; technical 
assistance to workers, managers and public officials confronting military 
cutbacks; and research on conversion issues.

Beth Delson, Editor; Michael Closson, Executive Director; Joan Holtzman, 
Development Coordinator; Marie Jones, Conversion Planner; Susan Strong, 
Senior Research Associate; Rosemary Wick, Office Manager.
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