Counteracting Ingrained Practices of Community Development in the US South The Case of Klondike/Smokey City in Memphis TN, USA

In the US, the field of community development has become an increasingly contested terrain where non-governmental entities routinely integrate their neighborhood improvement initiatives with those proposed and implemented by public authorities. This paper analyzes the assumptions and some of the problematic and unresolved issues tied to the rhetoric of community development by exploring the community-based development efforts of the Klondike Smokey City (KSC) community, a historic African American neighborhood in Memphis, TN. In particular, this paper highlights some of the lessons learned during an action-oriented research process carried out by a newly established partnership involving the KSC Community Development Corporation (CDC) and the City and Regional Planning (CRP) Department at the University of Memphis. This paper reflects on how alternative approaches to planning scholarship inspired by action-research might be conducive to revealing and addressing some of the most challenging issues faced by selforganization practices.