CSCM288651 by Juan Pardo

Katrina and the Collapse of Civil Society in New Orleans Norman K. Denzin University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

“I don’t want to abolish government. I simply want to reduce it to the size where I can drag it into the bathroom and drown it in the bathtub.” Grover Norquist, as quoted by Friedman, 2005

America’s collective relationship to itself, to the Bush Administration, and to the world once again changed as a result of the events following Hurricane Katrina.1 Like the destructive effects of the Bush Administration on the American social structure since September 11, 2001, the effects of Katrina have not been immediately visible. “The disaster was incremental rather than cataclysmic” (Johnson, 2005a, p. 25). Instead of a single, epiphanic moment, the effects unfolded in an infinite series of events, memories, the blur of crisis, the last words of a loved one, how President Bush looked looking down on the submerged city out of the window from Air Force One, “every portrait of the storm is different, like a jigsaw puzzle in which no two pieces are alike” (Johnson, 2005a, p. 25). If September 11, 2001 and the Iraq War bookend one cataclysmic phase of the Bush Administration, then Katrina bookmarks an equally critical moment. Accordingly, it is necessary to police the responses of this administration to the crisis surrounding Katrina and its aftermath. This discourse should move in three directions at the same time. It is necessary to start with the personal and the biographical, the stories of racism, poverty, loss, death, and suffering. These stories connect the personal to the political, the cultural, the historical, to the political economies of racism and poverty in America, New Orleans as the universal singular, the city that time forgot. *** We do not have an exact human vocabulary for the loss of a city — our great iconic city, so graceful . . . insular, self-delighted . . . the one New Orleanians always said that care forgot, and that sometimes . . . forgot to care. Ford, 2005, p. 11

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Author’s Note: Henry Giroux suggested this project. I thank Michael Giardina for his comments on an earlier version of this article. Cultural Studies ↔ Critical Methodologies, Volume 7 Number 2, 2007 145-153 DOI: 10.1177/1532708606288651 © 2007 Sage Publications 145 Downloaded from http://csc.sagepub.com by Juan Pardo on March 20, 2008 © 2007 SAGE Publications. All rights reserved. Not for commercial use or unauthorized distribution.

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What words do we use to speak of this loss? What has been lost? *** Gloria Ladson-Billings (2003): They sold slaves in this city. They made a tourist stop out the place where they sold slaves!

Did Katrina erase racism? Constantine, Erickson, and Tse (2005): Areas of New Orleans with significant flooding: Black (76%) White (18%). (p. Al3)

Anne Rice (2005, paraphrase): There is no diminishing the horror of the slave market in the middle of the famous St. Louis Hotel. (p. 11)

*** Second, a critical discourse must be launched at the level of the current federal government. In the last 4 days of August 2005, Grover Norquist (quoted above) had his wish. Hurricane Katrina reduced civil society as it had been known in the Big Easy to a size where it was dragged into a huge sinking, stinking outdoor bathroom called New Orleans. There in the squalor, the death, and the disease civil society under “compassionate conservatism drowned in the filthy bathtub that the city had become.” As if it was following directions from Norquist, Katrina effectively abolished civil society and all that we think we want a humane society to mean for Blacks and the urban poor. The erasure of the barriers between the lake, the river, and the city symbolically and materially represented the collapse of the civic structure of the city. In the dark swirling waters of the river, death and disease found a home. Parish after parish flooded. And what of the rich, the wealthy, the tourists? They all left before the violence hit. Left behind to fight for their lives were those without resources, the elderly, the poor, little children, single mothers. As many as 10,000 may be dead. And Washington watched. (In fact, the whole world watched in horror!) Four days into the disaster, President Bush visited the city, looking down from Air Force One as it cruised over the flooded delta. He exclaimed, “It’s devastating. It’s got to be doubly devastating on the ground.” What went wrong? How could this tragedy happen? The fingers of blame are pointing everywhere, including the Federal Emergency Management Agency and its director Michael Brown, Homeland Security and its director Michael Chertoff, state and local officials, the Mayor of New Orleans Ray Nagin, the

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police, the Army Corps of Engineers, a flawed hurricane rescue plan. A failure of leadership? A dereliction of duty? *** Third, there is a clear need for a national conversation on the meanings of the aftermath of Katrina. What do we want our American cities to look like? Can we build cities that do not hide racism and poverty behind the facades of culture, cuisine, and carnival? Can we include in the reconstruction of New Orleans the fullrange of voices that extend across the political, economic, cultural, and religious spectrum, from right to left, to green, peace, women, gays, lesbians, the poor, old, young, all religions. Katrina offers an opportunity to rethink what a radically free democratic city, a city that cares, might look like. *** E-mail message received, news report, CNN (September 7, 2005): Louisiana’s Defense of Marriage Act makes it specifically illegal for any local organization which receives state assistance to provide aid for gay and lesbian families.

The new New Orleans? Same as the old. Gays and lesbians need not apply. Houston Chronicle (September 1, 2005): Halliburton hired for storm cleanup — The Navy has hired Houston-based Halliburton Co. to restore electric power, repair roofs, and remove debris at three naval facilities in Mississippi damaged by Hurricane Katrina. If Haliburton is good enough for Iraq, it is surely good enough for New Orleans.

*** Progressives must revise their theories of the good society to fit the contingencies of this new century. Can they use the aftermath of Katrina to outline a moral theory of a caring, democratic society, a society that empowers the poor, confronts oppression in all its forms, celebrates diversity and difference, and honors the environment and our relationship to the natural world? *** Progressive critics suggest that we should not be surprised by the Bush Administration. The small government ideologues in the Republican party have systematically reduced federal support for the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and Homeland Security. They packed FEMA and the Homeland Security Administration with party loyalists and campaign contributors who are not qualified to judge an Arabian horse show. They have undercut funding for schools and welfare, demolished environmental protection laws, made a mockery of civil rights. Those who want to abolish government are committed to destroying the infrastructures of civil society. They are committed to a death game, to standing by and watching human beings suffer and die. This is death by intelligent design. It is

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the natural consequence of having the federal government wither away and disappear, just like the city of New Orleans as it drowned under the flood waters of Katrina and the disinterested eyes of the President. *** Fragments: A Montage The Corpse on Union Street *** September 7, 2005: “On Union Street in downtown New Orleans a corpse in a body bag decomposes for days, like carrion” (Barry, 2005, p. A19). *** Meanwhile, the same day, “Soldiers aims guns at the heads of several men suspected of robbing an electronic store, and a man in a pick-up truck drives by asking for directions to the interstate” (Barry, 2005, pp. A1, A19). *** Wednesday, September 7, 2005: Random headlines and advertisements: “Mayor to Holdouts: Get Out” (2005) “Illinois Terminal to House Center for Evacuees” (Monson, 2005) “Area Sends Firefighters to Big Easy” (Sridharan, 2005) “What Lies Beneath? New Orleans Begins Healing Process as Flood Waters Recede” (2005) “Flooding Recedes in New Orleans; Pressure on Holdouts Grows — Fear of Fire and Disease” (2005) “In Nursing Home, a Fight Lost to Rising Waters” (Harris, 2005) “Water Returned to Lake Pontchartrain Contains Toxic Material” (Chan & Revkin, 2005) “Remember Help Received After Sept. 11, New York Sends 303 Officers to Louisiana” (2005) “Bush Vows to Seek Answers to Failures of Storm Relief ” (2005) “With Jails Flooded, Bus Station Fills the Void” (Berenson, 2005) “Navy Pilots Who Rescued Victims Are Reprimanded” (Cloud, 2005) “45 Bodies Found in New Orleans Hospital” (Johnson, 2005b) Lord & Taylor: “Let’s Help. We’ve all seen the images. Now its time to help people recover from Hurricane Katrina. We would like to partner with you in this effort. Our relief program is starting on Wednesday, September 7th when you can make a purchase at any Lord & Taylor store and the May Department Stores Company . . . will match your donations, up to a total of one million dollars.” (Lord & Taylor, 2005) Wal-Mart: “The Power of us all working together is stronger than any storm. As members of the communities affected by Hurricane Katrina, we’re committed to

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their recovery. To make it convenient for our customers . . . to contribute to the relief efforts, all 3,800 Wal-Mart and Sam’s Club locations have established collection centers to accept financial donations.” (Wal-Mart, 2005)

Memories Richard Ford: I have a memory of a hot and breathless summer. It is many summers joined into one. My mother took me onto the Algiers Ferry, an open boat with cars driven onto the deck. Out on the great sliding brown river there was the only hint of breeze you could find anywhere. Back and across to the foot of Canal Street. Back and across we went. She brought me pralines. I held her hand. (Ford, 2005, p. 11)

Anne Rice: Thousands didn’t leave New Orleans because they couldn’t leave. They didn’t have the money . . . the vehicles . . . any place to go. They are the poor, black and white. . . . To my country I want to say this: During this crisis you failed us; you dismissed our victims. . . . You want our Jazz Fest, you want our Mardis Gras, you want our cooking and our music. Then when you saw us in real trouble . . . you turned your back on us. (Rice, 2005, p. 11)

*** Jocelyn Donlon, codirector, Center for Cultural Resources: We want to create a central data base for all the different organizations that are collecting stories. . . . We want to focus on how these stories might influence future public policy. (as quoted in Johnson, 2005a, p. 32)

Netanya Watts Hart: We walked out of the North Ward in about five feet of water, and we put all the children — 14 children — we put them in a flatboat along with a woman with one leg and walked a mile in the water. Then the water went down enough and we walked about two more miles and all the children were holding hands, singing gospel songs two by two. (as quoted in Johnson, 2005a, p. 32)

Margaret Chopin (paraphrase): We were piling together in our cars on Sunday before the storm to head north out of New Orleans for higher ground, at the last second Roy Joseph Jr., my younger brother, stepped out of the car. His fear of crossing over water was too much. He couldn’t face the trip. He told us to go on. We talked to him Monday night. His car had been crushed by a tree and was underwater. He said he was all right. We haven’t heard from him since. (as quoted in Johnson, 2005a, p. 32)

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Bill O’Reilly, Fox News Channel (on looting after the storm): A lot of people who stayed wanted to do this destruction, why weren’t they being shot on sight? (as quoted in Alterman, 2005, p. 11)

Peggy Noonan (2005): As far as the tragic piggism that is taking place on the streets of New Orleans, it is not unbelievable but it is unforgivable, and I hope the looters are shot. (p. 3)

Barbara Bush (2005) (touring hurricane relief centers in Houston): Things are working out very well for the poor evacuees from New Orleans. What I’m hearing is they all want to stay in Texas. Everyone is so overwhelmed by the hospitality. And so many of the people in the arena here, you know, were underprivileged anyway so this — this (chuckles slightly) is working very well for them.

Oliver Thomas: The French Quarter, Algiers, and the St. Charles Avenue corridor — all those big houses, all the things the tourists want to see — they’re all still in place. (as quoted in Schwartz et al., 2005, p. A13)

Narrator: I have a color photograph taken in 1973 of my daughters, and my father on the upper deck of a large tug boat on the Mississippi River. Jackson Square and Cafe Du Monde are in the background. A black jazz band is playing on the river’s edge. My father was the captain on this boat and my daughters were 7 and 8 years old. The wind off the river is blowing their hair. My father has a big grin on his face. The muddy water of the Mississippi River surrounds the boat. There is a smell of rain in the air. A screeching sea gull perches on the boat railing. An orange sun hovers in the sky above. My father died in 1995. Last week, Jackson Square and Cafe Du Monde were under water. The tug boat is long gone. My daughters have faded memories of this trip, remembering the split lip one of them got when grandpa’s car was hit by a speeding car in Audubon Park, which was also under water last week. Today, these memories fade into one another, replaced by this scene. The date is August 16, 1977: I was in the patio of a live jazz bar on Bourbon Street in the French Quarter the day Elvis Presley died. Six Black teenagers sat around a table shucking freshly boiled shrimp. The jazz music stopped and over the speakers came the announcement that Elvis had died. The six young men stood up and cheered. The King of rock and roll was dead, and in New Orleans, in a back patio of a jazz bar, six representatives of Black America cheered. This is all I need to know today about race in America. There are two Americas: one Black and Brown, and poor and disenfranchised; the other White, and propertied, and entertained by the likes of over-the-hill White rock and roll singers, who stole their music from Blacks.

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Needed: Democratic Reconstruction When Mexico City was struck by a devastating earthquake in 1985 . . . 40,000 refugees marched on the government, refusing to be relocated out of their neighborhoods and demanding a “Democratic Reconstruction.” Not only were 50,000 new dwellings for the homeless build in a year, the neighborhood groups that that grew out of the rubble launched a movement that is challenging Mexico’s traditional power holders to this day. (Klein, 2005, p. 12)

September 15, 2005: Karl Rove, President Bush’s chief of staff, is in charge of the New Orleans reconstruction effort (Bumiller & Stevenson, 2005). This is not promising! In the meantime, Democrats sit on the sidelines, waiting for Bush to make still another mistake. But the rebuilding of New Orleans cannot be given over to Bush and his administration. *** Progressives must come forward. They must think through the implications of what a democratic reconstruction of New Orleans would look like. This could include the development and use of worker’s councils, neighborhood and local citizen’s groups, competitions for the design of public housing, a full-scale commitment to using minority contractors, and workers in a new Worker’s Public Administration program. These efforts would be dedicated to the rebuilding of the city on a democratic foundation. This would be a new New Orleans designed around and embedded in the values and cultures of those groups the power structure of the city have for too long exploited for its own purposes. This would be a New Orleans that truly honors Black and cajun civic culture and the rich musical heritage of its famous jazz musicians, a heritage that has been for too long exploited and used as a tourist attraction. A democratically reconstructed New Orleans would embrace the disenfranchised and the poor. Its civic culture would transcend the sadness of those famous jazz and blues dirges: “When The Saints Go Marchin’ In,” “St. Louis Blues,” “St. James’s Infirmary.” It would be a new day, what a new morning, “What a Little Moonlight” and some loving civic compassion “Can Do.” *** Reality: Expedited Contracts September 13, 2005: The Army Corps of Engineers will award $1.5 billion in contracts this week for hurricane cleanup operations in Louisiana. . . . Just last week, FEMA announced the awarding of several $100 million no-bid contracts. . . . Critics noticed that among those receiving contracts were politically connected companies like the Fluor

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Corporation . . . Halliburton . . . and the Shaw Group . . . which is a client of Joe M. Allbaugh, the former head of FEMA, who now has a private lobbying and consulting firm. . . . Halliburton is also a client of Mr. Allbaugh who is a close friend of President Bush. (Wayne, 2005, p. C4)

*** A racially divided, disorganized, violent, falling-apart-at-the-seams New Orleans; this is George Bush and Karl Rove’s gift to America. And as New Orleans rebuilds, crony capitalism rules the day. So much for democratic reconstruction. Note 1. This chronicle of responses to Katrina is confined to the dates of August 29 to September 15, 2005.

References Alterman, E. (2005, September 26). Found in the flood. Nation, p. 11. Barry, D. (2005, September 8). Macabre reminder: The corpse on Union Street. New York Times, pp. A1, A19. Berenson, A. (2005, September 7). With jails flooded, bus station fills the void. New York Times, p. A21. Bumiller, E., & Stevenson, R. W. (2005, September 15). Speech is expected to focus on vision of reconstruction. New York Times, p. A18. Bush, B. (2005, September 5). Remarks on National Public Radio marketplace segment. National Public Radio. Bush vows to seek answers to failures of storm relief. (2005, September 7). New York Times, p. A22. Chan, S., & Revkin, A. C. (2005, September 7). Water returned to Lake Pontchartrain contains toxic material. New York Times, p. A18. Cloud, D. S. (2005, September 7). Navy pilots who rescued victims are reprimanded. New York Times, p. A21. Constantine, D., Erickson, M., & Tse, A. (2005, September 12). Neighborhoods that were hit hard and those that weren’t. New York Times, p. A13. Flooding recedes in New Orleans; pressure on holdouts grows — fear of fire and disease. (2005, September 7). New York Times, p. A1. Ford, R. (2005, September 4). A city beyond the reach of empathy. New York Times, p. 11. Friedman, T. L. (2005, September 7). Osama and Katrina. New York Times, p. A29. Harris, G. (2005, September 7). In nursing home, a fight lost to rising waters. New York Times, p. A1. Johnson, K. (2005a, September 11). For storm survivors, a mosaic of impressions rather than a crystalline moment. New York Times, pp. 25, 32. Johnson, K. (2005b, September 13). 45 bodies found in New Orleans hospital. New York Times, p. A1. Klein, N. (2005, September 26). Needed: A people’s reconstruction. Nation, p. 12.

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Ladson-Billings, G. (2003, April). Egon Guba distinguished lecture. Paper presented at the American Education Research Association Annual Meetings, New Orleans, LA. Lord & Taylor. (2005, September 7). Let’s help [advertisement]. New York Times, p. A7. Mayor to holdouts: Get out. (2005, September 7). The News Gazette, p. 1. Monson, M. (2005, September 7). Illinois terminal to house center for evacuees. The News Gazette, p. 1. Noonan, P. (2005, September 8). Piggism in New Orleans. Wall Street Journal, p. 3. Remember help received after Sept. 11, New York sends 303 officers to Louisiana. (2005, September 7). New York Times, p. A18. Rice, A. (2005, September 4). Do you know what it means to lose New Orleans? New York Times, p. 11. Schwartz, J., Revkin, A., Wald, M., Chan, S., Drew, C., & Lipton, E. (2005, September 12). In trying to revive New Orleans, residents will face a challenge of many tiers. New York Times, pp. A11, A13. Sridharan, V. (2005, September 7). Area sends firefighters to Big Easy. Daily Illini, p. 1. Wal*Mart. (2005, September 7). The power of us all working together is stronger than any storm [advertisement]. New York Times, p. A9. Wayne, L. (2005, September 13). Expedited contracts for cleanup are testing regulations. New York Times, p. C4. What lies beneath? New Orleans begins healing process as flood waters recede. (2005, September 7). Daily Illini, p. 1.

Norman K. Denzin is a professor of communications, sociology, and cinema studies at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He is coeditor of The Handbook of Qualitative Research and founding president of the International Association of Qualitative Inquiry.

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