Honors Thesis Defense Prep

Explain your thesis in 20 seconds

This thesis examines how progressive planning structures in Chapel Hill reproduce housing exclusion despite explicit commitments to equity. Through archival analysis of planning documents and spatial analysis of demographic data, I identify four institutional mechanisms—fragmented governance, procedural deferral, technical rationalization, and participation without power—that structure development decisions in ways that maintain racial and economic separation without explicit exclusionary policy.

What is your core argument in one sentence?

Exclusion in Chapel Hill operates not through explicit housing prohibitions but through institutional architecture that structures planning decisions in ways that delay, constrain, or redirect development outcomes.

Why study Chapel Hill?

Chapel Hill is a useful case because it combines strong progressive political identity with persistent housing scarcity and demographic stratification. This makes it a revealing site for examining how exclusion can operate through institutional processes rather than overt opposition to equity. It is also a community that I am passionate about as I have grown to love this town over the course of my undergraduate career.

What is your research question?

How can a town that publicly commits to equity, inclusion, and environmental justice produce housing outcomes that reinforce racial and economic exclusion?

What does your thesis contribute to scholarship?

It shows how modern day exclusion can be reproduced through institutional mechanisms rather than explicit policy barriers, identifying institutional mechanisms that help explain why progressive municipalities may still produce unequal housing outcomes

Name and define the four mechanisms

Fragmented governance

Decision-making authority is distributed across jurisdictions, diffusing responsibility and slowing action.

Procedural deferral

Decisions are repeatedly postponed through additional studies, consultations, and administrative sequencing.

Technical rationalization

Planning decisions are framed primarily through technical criteria such as environmental modeling or infrastructure capacity.

Participation without power

Public input is incorporated procedurally but rarely alters institutional decision structures.

Why do these mechanisms produce exclusion?

Because they delay or constrain housing development without requiring explicit rejection of affordable housing. The cumulative effect of these institutional processes limits access to housing while maintaining procedural legitimacy.

How did you conduct the study?

I used a mixed-method approach combining qualitative archival analysis of planning documents and council records with quantitative spatial analysis of demographic and income data using ACS and PolicyMap datasets.

What qualitative sources did you analyze?

council meeting minutes

staff memoranda

environmental assessments

planning presentations

interlocal agreements

public comment records

consultant reports

Why archival analysis?

Because institutional mechanisms operate through documented processes—planning documents, meeting records, and policy reports—which provide insight into how decisions are structured rather than simply what outcomes occur.

What quantitative data did you use?

• American Community Survey 5-year estimates

• PolicyMap spatial datasets

  • census block group data for racial composition, income distribution, and poverty rates.

Why analyze block groups instead of larger census units?

Block groups provide finer geographic resolution, allowing the analysis to capture local spatial disparities that would be obscured at the tract or municipal level.

How do your qualitative and quantitative findings connect?

The qualitative analysis explains the institutional processes shaping development decisions, while the quantitative analysis demonstrates the spatial inequalities that are a direct result of those institutional structures.

Why focus on the Greene Tract?

The Greene Tract serves as a case study because it sits at the intersection of multiple jurisdictions and planning processes, making it an ideal site for observing how governance structures influence development outcomes.

What is your main policy recommendation?

Rather than creating new frameworks, municipalities should embed existing equity tools into land-use decision processes by requiring equity assessments and equity index references before zoning approvals and development decisions.

Why enforce equity frameworks earlier in the process?

Because equity commitments often exist rhetorically but are not embedded in the procedural stages where development decisions actually occur.

What is the main limitation of your study?

The study focuses on a single municipality and relies partly on ACS estimates with margins of error, so the findings illustrate structural patterns rather than providing precise causal measurement.

If it’s one case, why is it valuable?

Case studies reveal institutional mechanisms that may operate in other contexts, providing conceptual insight that can guide comparative research across municipalities.

How do you justify your causal claims?

The thesis does not claim direct causal proof but demonstrates consistent institutional patterns that plausibly shape housing outcomes, supported by both documentary evidence and spatial demographic analysis.

How does your work connect to broader scholarship?

It builds on research on land-use regulation, segregation, and the political economy of zoning by showing how institutional processes can sustain inequality even within progressive governance contexts.

Ending of Defense

This thesis demonstrates that housing exclusion in progressive communities does not necessarily arise from explicit opposition to equity but from institutional architectures that shape how planning decisions are made.

What would change if your recommendations were implemented?

Embedding equity assessments into zoning and development review processes would shift when equity considerations enter decision-making, potentially altering how development proposals are evaluated.

Why focus on enforcing existing equity frameworks instead of proposing a new one?

Many municipalities already possess equity tools, but they are not consistently integrated into decision processes. Enforcement and procedural integration may be more feasible than creating new frameworks.

What is the biggest limitation of your study?

The study focuses on a single case and relies on ACS estimates with margins of error, so the findings should be interpreted as identifying structural patterns rather than precise causal effects.