Economic and Social Factors Influence the Civil Rights Movement

     There were many broad economic and social factors that influenced the civil rights movement of the mid Twentieth Century. The nationalization of American culture, industrialization, urbanization, and white flight all had an impact on the movement and how it was carried out.
     The nationalization of the American culture was energized by the proliferation of major mass media, especially television, in the 1950s. This brought about a change in the nation's attitudes towards race relations. "For decades the terror that served as the ultimate enforcer of the South's caste system had drawn only casual attention from the white North. But the assaults on the Freedom Riders received major media coverage" (Boyer, 226). By putting the violence that was being thrust upon black-skinned Americans into the eyes and minds of all Americans, and into the living room TV sets of many, the media "helped to push civil rights high on the national agenda" (Boyer, 226). This is what made the early governmental support of the movement possible, because nobody inside the political belt way of Washington DC generally cared enough to act unless they were forced to do by public reaction extraordinary events. (Boyer, 226) If it weren't for TV and other major media, these extraordinary events in the South may have gone relatively unnoticed to people outside of the South, and therefore it would have stayed below the radar of national politicians. As TV nationalized the American culture, it made clear the national effect of the events in the South.
     Industrialization and urbanization set the pieces in place for what was to become the civil rights movement. Industrialization led black-skinned Americans into the cities with the lure of factory work. This urbanization caused pockets of black residence that would become ghettos. This set the stage, but what lit the torch that lead the civil rights movement outside of the South was the deurbanization of American factories and consequent deindustrialization. As manufacturing plants left the northern urban areas, their black-skinned workers were left without work or opportunity. One clear case of these phenomena is Detroit, a city where, "The problems of limited housing, racial animosity, and reduced economic opportunity for a segment of the black population ?had lead to embitterment" (Sugrue, Major Problems, 273). Urban blacks were left with so few good options, that less legal options such as gambling, whiskey distillation, and prostitution began to seem legitimate. (Sugrue, Major Problems, 273)
These problems lead to mass exit from America's urban areas: The suburban population in the United States grew by 16 million between 1950 and 1960. (Boyer, 121) But, most of these new suburbanites were not black-skinned Americans because "few?in the 1960s had the option of following the exodus of employment; residentital segregation and lack of resources kept most trapped in the city" (Sugrue, Major Problems, 274).
     It was this deindustrialization that helped to spur action from the civil rights movement in northern cities. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., "Challenged and nurtured by the powerful commitment of Malcolm X to the black street forces?was compelled by his own deep compassion for the urban black community" (Harding, Major Problems, 267). With the help of these factors, the civil rights business became the close, personal problem of all American - not just the South. And, thus, it grew in strength, significance and success.

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WORKS CITED

Boyer, Paul. Promises to Keep: The United States Since World War II. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1999

Griffith, Robert and Baker, Paula. Major Problems in American History Since 1945. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2001.

Harding, Vicent Gordon. King as Disturber of the Peace. Major Problems.

Sugrue, Thomas J. The Continuing Racial Crisis. Major Problems.