Gated-community emergence in the metro east: Residential growth and development in St. Clair County, Illinois

The emergence and spread of the "gated community" phenomenon in the late 1970s in states such as California and Florida brought renewed vigor to the ongoing discussion of the meaning and importance of community in America. Gated communities are part of the current privatization movement, and where distinctions between public and private space and authority should be drawn, and what social and political changes occur in any redefinition and/or restructuring of community are at the core of this debate.; Hofferbert's Open Systems Model for Comparative Policy Formation provided elements for the research design pertaining to the recent emergence of gated communities in the Metro East region of greater St. Louis, Missouri. Findings indicated there was no substantive evidence of a Metro East "growth machine" attempting to redefine the region, and that the gated-community model was meeting local public and private sector resistance. Historic and cultural norms, hyper-segregation of municipalities, and the emergence of the term "quasi- or semi-gated community," not previously found in gated-community literature, may offer evidence as to why gated communities have not enjoyed the success in the Metro East that has been noted in other regions of the United States.