Post-1960s New York City is often imagined as exceptional—too big, too singular, too creative to fit prevailing trajectories of American history. Gotham on the Verge challenges that mythology. In seventeen essays, leading and emerging historians show late-twentieth-century New York not as an outlier but as a crucible for the forces that reshaped the nation. Covering the 1970s through the early 2000s, this volume examines the rise and consequences of post-industrialization, neoliberalism, and financialization during a transformative era in the city’s history.

The essays explore deindustrialization, the rise of finance and real estate, the city’s response to the AIDS epidemic, police violence, labor organizing among new immigrants, and the birth of hip hop and experimental art. Writing from the street level up, the contributors center ordinary New Yorkers: residents who challenged stigmatizing media portrayals, Black women who organized against police brutality, and immigrant workers who built coalitions for fair wages. Neither a story of collapse nor comeback, this book traces a city on the verge—revealing how crisis, growth, diversity, and inequality converged to forge modern New York and America.

Contributors are Bench Ansfield, Minju Bae, Andy Battle, Salonee Bhaman, Amanda T. Boston, Jim Downs, Ansley T. Erickson, Michael Glass, Dylan Gottlieb, LaShawn Harris, Benjamin Holtzman, Nick Juravich, Lauren Lefty, Sarah Miller-Davenport, Brian Purnell, Pedro A. Regalado, and Alex S. Vitale.

Johanna Fernández was associate professor of US history at the CUNY Graduate Center and Baruch College. Kim Phillips-Fein is Robert Gardiner-Kenneth T. Jackson Professor of History at Columbia University. Mason B. Williams is associate professor of leadership studies and political science, and faculty affiliate in history at Williams College.

"An astute collection of perspectives on New York City during a decadeslong period of acute transformation.”—Kirkus Reviews

“It is rare indeed for a collection of essays centered on a single city to capture the pulse of a nation itself as it lurched from the perils and possibilities of the 1970s to the horrors and hopes of the present day. Gotham on the Verge is a rich, powerful, and remarkably thought-provoking account of all that New York City has been, all that it is, and all that it, and thus America, might yet become.”—Heather Ann Thompson, author of Whose Detroit?: Politics, Labor and Race in a Modern American City

“Through insightful, humanistic, bottom-up narratives, this book reveals how ordinary New Yorkers—through navigating economic inequality, shifting governance, and evolving demographics—shaping the city, and how New York shaped the nation. Gotham on the Verge offers fresh insights into the city’s transformative decades, making it essential for understanding both New York and contemporary America.”—Hasan Kwame Jeffries, author of Bloody Lowndes: Civil Rights and Black Power in Alabama’s Black Belt

“An expertly edited volume that offers a provocative, deeply researched exploration of late twentieth-century New York City, illuminates the political, cultural, and economic forces that shaped the city, and helps readers understand its past, navigate its present, and grasp its complex history.”—Shannon King, author of The Politics of Safety: The Black Struggle for Police Accountability in La Guardia’s New York

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