This book addresses the questions of what went wrong with Detroit and what can be done to reinvent the Motor City. Various answers to the former--deindustrialization, white flight, and a disappearing tax base--are now well understood. Less discussed are potential paths forward, stemming from alternative explanations of Detroit's long-term decline and reconsideration of the challenges the city currently faces.

Urban crisis--socioeconomic, fiscal, and political--has seemingly narrowed the range of possible interventions. Growth-oriented redevelopment strategies have not reversed...