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New Orleans After the Promises...Poverty,
Citizenship, and the Search for The Great Society
By Kent Germany
 In
the 1960s and 1970s, New Orleans experienced one of the greatest
transformations in its history. Its people replaced Jim Crow, fought a
War on Poverty, and emerged with glittering skyscrapers, professional
football, and a building so large it had to be called the Superdome. New
Orleans after the Promises looks back at that era to explore how a few
thousand locals tried to bring the Great Society to Dixie. With faith in
God and American progress, they believed that they could conquer
poverty, confront racism, establish civic order, and expand the economy.
At a time when liberalism seemed to be on the wane nationally, black and
white citizens in New Orleans cautiously partnered with each other and
with the federal government to expand liberalism in the South.
As Kent Germany examines how the civil rights, antipoverty, and
therapeutic initiatives of the Great Society dovetailed with the
struggles of black New Orleanians for full citizenship, he defines an
emerging public/private governing apparatus that he calls the "Soft
State": a delicate arrangement involving constituencies as varied as
old-money civic leaders and Black Power proponents who came together to
sort out the meanings of such new federal programs as Community Action,
Head Start, and Model Cities. While those diverse groups
struggled-violently on occasion-to influence the process of racial
inclusion and the direction of economic growth, they dramatically
transformed public life in one of America's oldest cities. While many
wonder now what kind of city will emerge after Katrina, New Orleans
after the Promises offers a detailed portrait of the complex city that
developed after its last epic reconstruction.
About the Author
Kent Germany, a Louisiana native and former resident of New Orleans,
is an assistant professor and deputy director of the Presidential
Recordings Program at the University of Virginia's Miller Center of
Public Affairs. He is coeditor of two books about Lyndon Johnson and the
1960s: The Kennedy Assassination and the Transfer of Power and Toward
the Great Society.
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