- "Field
of Schemes"
by Joanna Cagan (Editor), Neil De Mause, Joanna Cagon, Neil deMause
ISBN: 1567511384
- Trenchant
analysis of a troubling phenomenon, August 3, 2002
Reviewer: Birdwell from Frederick, MD USA
"Field of Schemes" is an accessible but no less incisive
critique of an often overlooked aspect of the corporate welfare
phenomenon: professional sports team owners and the seemingly
insatiable lust for obtaining ever-more-lavish stadiums to be
built at public expense. Sports fans Joanna Cagan and Neil deMause
combine original and secondary research with interviews to successfully
chronicle and analyse the public stadium building boom in an
entertaining yet thought-provoking manner.
Cagan and deMause paint a picture of a playing field that is
decidedly not even. Local communities are pitted in a struggle
against powerful coalitions of wealthy sports moguls, politicos,
real estate developers and other related businesspeople (which
oftentimes includes the local media, since sports helps sells
newspapers and TV advertising) over the allocation of increasingly
scarce public tax revenues. The authors show that public education
in particular seems to bear the brunt of the burden whenever
the community loses the fight and sees its funds siphoned away
to build these private sports palaces.
Cagan and deMause detail specific cases where owners have successfully
blackmailed communities and strong-armed local politicians. These
case studies reveal a formula that the authors term "the
art of the steal", a step-by-step game plan for owners who
plan to fleece their communities for free sports structures.
Shamelessly exploiting the community's emotional attachments
to the home team and ruthlessly working the good-ole-boy business
networks to which local politicians are beholden are a few of
the key ingredients that helps to make these schemes work, the
authors claim.
Cagan and deMause interview individuals associated with a few
of the grass-roots organizations that sprung up to oppose various
stadium initiatives. While such groups often experience initial
success, they are usually overwhelmed in the long run by the
persistence of the powerful forces lined up against them. Citing
numerous opinion polls and voter referendums where citizens strenuously
opposed the use of tax dollars to fund privately-owned stadiums,
the authors suggest that the reason owners win more often than
not is due to the greater political power at their disposal,
and not the democratic process.
Indeed, the cost to society as a whole is often great. In Chapter
8, "Bad Neigbors", Cagan and deMause brilliantly relate
baseball's current preoccupation with the recreation of a mythic
past (through the construction of "old time" ballparks
such as Camden Yards in Baltimore) with the real decay of America's
inner cities. The authors discover that many urban centers have
actually been subjected to a corporate "structural adjustment"
program akin to those experienced in many Third World nations.
They contend that a core problem is a system of private enterprise
that privileges the profit motive at the expense of ordinary
people.
The authors wrap up the book by alluding to signs that the public
stadium-building frenzy may be slowing down, but sadly this appears
to be the case mainly because most cities large enough to support
a sports franchise have already been tapped out. Fortunately,
the authors propose common-sense ideas that, if legislated, could
discourage some corporate welfare give-aways. For example, the
authors wonder why recipients shouldn't be required to report
the public subsidies they receive as taxable income? This would
vastly diminish the value of such subsidies and encourage private
financing for these deals, which is where the authors contend
they rightly belong.
I strongly recommend this book for both sports fans and non-sports
fans alike who may be pondering how our society's infatuation
with sports fantasy may be harming the real world in which we
live.
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