The Origins of the urban Crisis: Race and Inequality in Postwar Detroit, is the first book by historian and Detroit native Thomas J. Sugrue in which he examines the role race, housing and job discrimination played in the decline of Detroit. Sugrue argues that the decline of Detroit began long before the 1967 race riot. Sugrue argues that institutionalized and often legalized racism resulted in sharply limited opportunities for Detroit blacks for most of the twentieth century. The book has won multiple awards including a Bancroft Prize

Bancroft Prize

The Bancroft Prize is awarded each year by the trustees of Columbia University for books about diplomacy or the history of the Americas. It was established in 1948 by a bequest from Frederic Bancroft...

 in 1998.

Awards

Origins of the Urban Crisis won the 1998 Bancroft Prize

Bancroft Prize

The Bancroft Prize is awarded each year by the trustees of Columbia University for books about diplomacy or the history of the Americas. It was established in 1948 by a bequest from Frederic Bancroft...

 in American History, the 1996 Social Science History Association President's Book Award for a "first work by a beginning scholar", the 1996 Philip Taft

Philip Taft

Philip Taft was a noted labor historian whose research focused on the labor history of the United States and the American Federation of Labor.POORLY WRITTEN NEEDS MUCH IMPROVEMENT-Early life:...

Prize in Labor History, and the 1997 Urban History Association Prize for Best Book in North American Labor History. In 2005, Princeton University Press selected Origins of the Urban Crisis as one of its 100 most influential books of the preceding century and issued it as a Princeton Classic.