Rebuilding inner cities: Basic principles

Michael Porter has offered compelling and useful research explaining how inner-city businesses work. Porter's findings relate more specifically to business development than to general urban revitalization, however. Revitalization must involve whole persons, not simply the business sector. Several basic principles operate in situations of successful urban revitalization: adoption of holistic strategies that combine interrelated social, economic, and physical approaches; active involvement and participation by local residents and institutions; social justice; and paying special attention to creating opportunities and to income distribution.