Finding Security on Skid Row: The Positive Role of Organizational and Social Ties in Service Hubs in the United States and Japan

• Published date: 01 January 2021
• Date: 01 January 2021
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/0002716221997025
• Subject Matter: New Perspectives and Methods

ANNALS, AAPSS, 693, January 2021 301

DOI: 10.1177/0002716221997025

Finding

Security on

Skid Row: The

Positive Role of

Organizational

and Social Ties

in Service Hubs

in the United

States and

Japan

By

MATTHEW D. MARR

997025ANN The Annals Of The American AcademyFinding Security On Skid Row

research-article2021

Service hubs are neighborhoods where homelessness

and efforts to address it cluster. Are these “skid rows”

jails without bars, or are there ways that service hubs

bolster residents’ feelings of security about their lives?

To address these questions, I analyze ethnographic

interview data from sixty residents of four hubs—Skid

Row, Los Angeles; Overtown, Miami; Kamagasaki,

Osaka; and San’ya, Tokyo. I find that in these service

hubs, residents’ ontological security is supported by a

combination of engagement with organizations, access

to subsidized housing and income, and ties with family

and friends. However, this sense of security can be

undermined by negative experiences with police and

crime, poor sanitation, welfare and aid bureaucracy,

and redevelopment projects. I argue that these threats

should be addressed to enhance the strengths of service

hubs, which can provide important insights for efforts

toward more even geographic distribution of housing

and aid.

Keywords: service hubs; ontological security; home-

lessness; fuzzy set/qualitative comparative

analysis; organizations; social ties

Homelessness, both as exclusion and an

individual predicament, involves forces

operating at multiple social levels (Marr 2015).

Social structure at national and urban levels

manifested as differences in labor markets,

housing markets, social safety nets, and racial

and neighborhood inequalities impact the scope

of homelessness. As globalizing cities become

more unequal and housing markets are increas-

ingly financialized (Rolnik 2019), gentrification

and competition for urban space play a stronger

role in shaping places where homelessness,

Matthew D. Marr is an associate professor of sociology

in the Department of Global & Sociocultural Studies at

Florida International University. His research focuses

on homelessness in the United States and Japan, show-

ing how urban marginality is shaped by social condi-

tions operating at multiple levels, from the global to the

individual.

Correspondence: mmarr@fiu.edu

302 THE ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY

affordable housing, supportive services, and social movements concentrate (ser-

vice hub neighborhoods) (DeVerteuil 2016). These broader social contexts influ-

ence individual experiences of homelessness and escaping it, including how

health, social ties, income, and aid organizations impact maintaining long-term

housing and a subjective sense of security (ontological security). Understanding

how this sense of security is formed is important in promoting the long-term well-

being of persons who experience homelessness, including their ability to avoid

returns to homelessness. Also, understanding how different contexts impact feel-

ings of security sheds light on interventions that may be replicated elsewhere.

In this article, I explore the following question: How do social contexts at mul-

tiple levels combine and interact to impact the ontological security of people in

different forms of homelessness and housing in service hub neighborhoods? I

apply fuzzy set/qualitative comparative analysis (Ragin 2008) to ethnographic

interview data from residents of four service hubs (Skid Row, Los Angeles;

Overtown, Miami; Kamagasaki, Osaka; and San’ya, Tokyo). My findings show the

importance of organizational ties; housing, income, and health care subsidization;

and social ties in promoting a subjective sense of security in service hubs.

Contrary to the popular perception of service hubs as “jails without bars,” I argue

that these neighborhoods provide crucial social and organizational resources

even beyond permanent supportive housing (PSH).

While the extremity of the current crisis of housing deprivation in cities

around the globe calls for affordable housing to be created wherever possible, my

findings suggest that preserving and increasing affordable housing in service hub

neighborhoods could bolster residents’ ontological security by enabling access to

organizational and social ties. However, I also find that service hub residents’

sense of security was undermined by negative experiences with policing and

crime, a downgraded environment, redevelopment projects, and workfare

experiments. I explore ways that these threats can be addressed to strengthen the

supportive roles of these neighborhoods and provide lessons for efforts toward

more even spatial distribution of housing and services addressing homelessness.

Multilevel Dynamics of Homelessness, Service Hubs,

and Ontological Security

Research from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development

(HUD) has argued that housing first and homelessness prevention measures

have impacted the scale of homelessness in many communities in the United

NOTE: This research was assisted by a grant from the Abe Fellowship Program administered

by the Social Science Research Council in cooperation with and with funds provided by the

Japan Foundation Center for Global Partnership. Thank you to all who shared their experiences

with me and helped to arrange interviews. Also, thank you to the editors of this special issue and

to my writing group colleagues at FIU for your feedback on this article. Last, thank you Naoko

and Sara for your patience and support during the lengthy stay-at-home period of 2020–2021

while I wrote this article.