Voices of Decline is a sweeping history of dominant representations of the American city in the 20th century. Upon its initial publication in 1993, the book introduced discourse analysis and an appreciation of the shaping power of representation into American urban studies. Beauregard has identified a pervasive discourse of decline about American urban cities, one that shaped the policy to respond to the perceived urban crisis of the post-war era. This second edition has been thoroughly rewritten and now includes an account of the boom years of the 1990s.