How do Americans perceive cities, and why does it matter?

Americans tend to have strong feelings about cities. For many Americans, cities are almost not even real places at all, but mystical, foreign realms that represent and confirm their fears about crime, poverty, race, immigration, terrorism, and dozens of other social ills. Cities are not where decent, upstanding citizens live; they are simply a concentration of problems. Social scientists have recently begun to focus on the resentment of urban spaces and populations, especially among white Americans, and how this resentment affects political behavior and state decision-making.