The City of Detroit’s 2013 mayoral race could’ve been a slugfest. It could’ve been bloody, bruising and divisive for a city and region too often at odds within and among itself.
And yes, I’m talking about more than just the competitiveness of the election, with the most recent poll numbers giving candidate Mike Duggan, former CEO of the Detroit Medical Center, a commanding 2 to 1 lead over Wayne County Sheriff Benny Napoleon.
I’m also talking about the explicit racial implications.
“The white guy, Mike Duggan,” as one voter in Detroit’s August primary election wrote on his ballot, defied all political and campaign logic by taking a commanding 51 percent of votes in August’s primary election as a write-in candidate after being thrown off the ballot due to complications with his residency.
Before then, and even now, pundits, community officials and outside observers insisted that the election be about race, using every opportunity to turn the conversation toward the juxtaposition between Duggan’s whiteness and Napoleon’s continued residency and black legitimacy.
Although Duggan was born and raised in Detroit, he lived in suburban Livonia for years before returning to Detroit in 2012, anticipating a potential run for mayor — garnering the “carpetbagger” moniker from those most skeptical.
Even Napoleon’s camp has engaged in unflattering political discourse, making frequent allusions to Duggan’s status as an outsider. According to Napoleon campaign spokesman Jamaine Dickens, in a recently published Detroit Free Press article, Duggan “couldn’t find a specific Detroit neighborhood without a navigation system.”
In part, these statements comprise accepted campaign practice. Napoleon is saying what he thinks needs to be said in order to win an election, hoping to ultimately serve the city in the best way possible as its top official in 2014. But, at the same time, these jabs intentionally expose old wounds and a deep-seated racial antagonism that has permeated city-suburban politics for decades.
Fortunately for the city, though, Detroit voters aren’t having it. What could’ve been a perfect storm for stirring up municipal and regional animosity regarding race has turned into an election campaign characterized by indifference to racial politics.
One poll from September found that race is not a factor for nearly 80 percent of Detroit voters, a city that’s almost 83-percent Black according to 2010 census data.
Urban planning Prof. June Manning Thomas, who has written extensively on race and Detroit, said residents desire a candidate who possesses the skills to get the job done and demonstrates competent leadership, regardless of race.
Left unexamined are the broader implications for Duggan’s probable election, which would make him the first white mayor of Detroit since Roman Gribbs left office in 1974.
Appropriately, the Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning is hosting a symposium today titled “Planning in a ‘Post-Racial’ Society (?): New Directions and Challenges” in the University of Michigan Museum of Art. Though many claim that the United States has progressed into a “post-racial nation,” mountains of evidence exist to the contrary, with racially segregated Metropolitan Detroit oftentimes comprising the contradiction peak.
Regardless, though, Duggan’s seemingly imminent election indicates some healing in a city and region desperately needing even small moral victories.
And given Detroit’s current turmoil, we’ll take all the wins we can get.
Alexander Hermann can be reached at aherm@umich.edu.