The Long Crisis is an engaging and revelatory history of New York's transformation into a neoliberal metropolis. Going beyond well-worn stories led by national politicians, technocrats, and corporate leaders, Holtzman takes us from housing to parks to policing to show how the efforts of New Yorkers shaped a privatized, market-oriented city from the bottom up. A book filled with colorful characters and rife with irony, this is a much-needed and novel explanation of how a city once known for the generosity of its public sector came to serve the market first.
Benjamin Holtzman is an Assistant Professor of History at Lehman College.