Paper short abstract:

Based a 2006-2007 open-ended, semi-structured interview with 25 New York City coop residents, and 25 New York and Long Island previously collected gated community interviews, this paper queries the differences between these two forms of private governance; their social, psychological, and political consequences for residents; their systems of conflict resolution; and their impact on exclusionary housing practices.

Paper long abstract:

Do middle class cooperative housing residents have similar motivations for moving to coops as gated community residents? Do they experience the same kinds of conflicts and modes of conflict resolution with their coop boards and as gated community residents with their Homeowner Associations? What can be learned about the impact of private governance on diversity, exclusivity, and daily social interactions of residents living in coops and gated communities? The paper begins with a summary of the gated community/coop projects, outlining how the research has progressed from a study of signification, that is, of the symbolic order and modes of discourse that support private governance, to an analysis of the political, economic and legal institutions that produce the normative regulation of private housing. A description of the recent study of coops and the history of cooperative housing in New York City follows with a brief review of the original gated community study. Excerpts drawn from interviews are then used to illustrate the various dimensions of the comparison, focusing on the new areas of discourse found in the coop interviews and the differences in the interpretation of regulation and participation at each research site. Examples of these subtle differences include that coop residents are concerned with safety rather than security, while gated community residents want to feel safe and secure; and coop residents emphasize that they feel comfortable in their homes because they know they are with people like themselves, while gated community residents move to secured communities, hoping to find people like themselves.