'A city upon a hill’: The Wire and its distillation of the United States polity

Wheeler, Mark (2014) 'A city upon a hill’: The Wire and its distillation of the United States polity. Politics, 34 (3). pp. 237-247. ISSN 1467-9256

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Abstract / Description

The Home Box Office's series The Wire (2002–2008) provides an informed critique of the decline of the democratic American ideal of the ‘city upon a hill’. From its inception as a police procedural, it expanded its interests across the dystopian city of Baltimore to consider the linkage between drug crimes, policing, the collapse of blue-collar life, social deprivation, institutional compromise, the public school system, media compliance and political self-interest. Therefore, this article will situate The Wire into the debates that have defined the US polity and will discuss how it employs the narrative conventions of a contemporary thriller to offer an alternative view of American democracy.

Item Type:	Article
Uncontrolled Keywords:	The Wire; American politics; popular culture and politics
Subjects:	300 Social sciences > 320 Political science
Department:	School of Social Sciences (to June 2021) School of Social Sciences and Professions
Depositing User:	Mark Wheeler
Date Deposited:	06 Jul 2015 10:42
Last Modified:	27 May 2020 14:03
URI:	https://repository.londonmet.ac.uk/id/eprint/653

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