Support for Community Control Among Local Urban Elites

There are three typical interpretations of community control advanced by both analysts and activists: (1) minority group liberation, (2) community empowerment as a new-left program, and (3) community empowerment as a conservative program. Using these inter pretations, we analyze the attitudes toward community control of local elites in New York City in the period 1972-1974. Our findings indicate substantial levels of support for some form of community control among both white and minority respondents. While there are interracial differences in the degree of operational support for community control, these differences decreased from 1972 to 1974, as overall support increased. Variations in the level of support for community control are best explained by indexes reflecting evaluation of governmental performance (instrumental), and orientations to minority group power and to economic left ideas (ideological). The general interracial increase in support for community control, and the pattern of association of the three indexes with each other and with support for community control, suggest (1) community empowerment interpretations predominate; (2) of these, new left empowerment inter pretations are the most prevalent; (3) there is, however, a marked constituency of whites who support a conservative empowerment interpretation; while (4) there is not a signifi cant minority group liberation constituency. We conclude with a discussion of the impli cations of our findings, suggesting that contradictions inherent in the community control strategy have conservative consequences.