All-American City: Bluster, Boom, and Bust in Wichita

Distinctive. Unique. Authentic.

These were the watchwords in the 2020 campaign to revitalize Wichita, Kansas, and to set it apart in the perpetual competition among American urban centers for jobs, investment, population growth, and stature. The master plan to overhaul the riverfront was one of many efforts in which business leaders, elected officials, local boosters, and the general public frequently conflated seemingly contradictory impulses: the aspiration, on the one hand, to make the city stand out as a unique, authentic destination, and the obligation, on the other, to offer a suite of amenities to visitors, residents, and businesses similar or identical to those that could be found in other places believed to be competitors in a zero-sum contest for lucrative, but elusive, urban prizes.

In All-American City, sociologist Chase M. Billingham recounts the recent history of Wichita as a case study of a broader phenomenon across the American urban landscape in which the leaders of midsized cities embrace similarity, even while touting distinctiveness. Many cities appeal simultaneously to both authenticity and mimicry, with the result that cities across the country--and even across the world--that had previously enjoyed their own local flavors, regional cuisines, unique accents, and quirky customs increasingly look and feel the same. Wichita's story serves as a window through which to examine the delicate balance between sameness and distinction that characterizes many cities' economic development strategies.

With a journalist's eye for detail, Billingham chronicles the city's effort to attract a new Minor League baseball team, the closure of an underutilized park and the removal of unhoused people in an effort to revitalize downtown Wichita, local leaders' repeated efforts to cultivate civic pride in order to drive economic growth, and the increasingly vexed relationship between Wichita and its key economic base, the aviation manufacturing industry--compounded by a series of economic crises and exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic. All-American City reveals the challenges and perils that cities face when trying to stand out from the crowd.