Cities and Diversity: Should We Want It? Can We Plan For It?

Diversity has become the new orthodoxy of city planning. The term has several meanings: a varied physical design, mixes of uses, an expanded public realm, and multiple social grouping sexercising their “right to the city.” Its impetus lies in the postmodernist/poststructuralist critique of modernism’s master narratives and more specifically in reactions to the urban landscape created by segregation, urban renewal, massive housing projects, and highway building programs. Privileging diversity raises significant issues. Can planned environments produce diversity or only a “staged authenticity”? Does emphasizing diversity obscure the economic structure? Is there a connection between diversity and economic innovation? Does social diversity necessarily contribute to equity and a broadly satisfying public realm? Rather than setting diversity as the principal goal of city planning, I argue for the model of the just city, based on Nussbaum’s concept of capacities and a recognition of the inevitable trade-offs among equity, diversity, growth, and sustainability.