No Fire Next Time: Black-Korean Conflicts and the Future of America's Cities.(Now Read This)(Brief Article)(Book Review)

City Limits, May, 2004

No Fire Next Time: Black-Korean Conflicts and the Future of America's Cities

By Patrick Joyce

Cornell University Press, $19.95

During the 1992 LA riots, Korean-owned stores were singled out for torching. NYC blacks were also angry with Korean merchants, yet violence didn't happen here, just boycotts. For Joyce, the difference comes down to old-style versus newer politics. New York evolved from a 19th-century machine, but LA governs according to a reform, managerial model. Machines engage grassroots interest groups; managers don't. So when groups clash, the machine keeps them talking--like blacks and Koreans did in NYC--instead of exploding, as in LA.