Gated-ness, income segregation, and neighbourhood cohesion in Western Canadian metropolises.

This research investigated the relation between the degree of gated-ness of a neighbourhood and the level of neighbourhood cohesion among its residents. Such an investigation was prompted by the current practice of municipal planners for promoting a grid pattern of streets for neighbourhoods and linking such a pattern with principles of resilience and connectedness while at the same time condemning altogether the enclave pattern of curvilinear streets, loops and cul-de-sacs as being non-resilient and non-sustainable. Municipal planners seem to overlook the reasons behind the morphological development of postwar suburbs as well as overlook, in particular, socio-psychological effects of their physical structure and access configuration. This research introduces new typologies in order to differentiate neighbourhoods along those two structural aspects. By undertaking a comparative analysis of four case studies in two Western Canadian metropolises, this research argues that semi-gated neighbourhoods raise cohesion among residents. The major findings of the research are that residents’ sense of neighbourhood cohesion, for both its affective and interactive dimensions, increased in the case of neighbourhoods that had a sense of enveloping space, a sense of entry into a domain that is signalled by the degree of exclusion and seclusion of the development. This research does not claim that all neighbourhoods need to be single access ones. Rather, it suggests that in as much as a neighbourhood is successful in conveying a cohesive image for such a domain, in as much do residents identify with the neighbourhood and with each other. The aesthetic quality of such a domain plays a role of informing residents who gradually develop an embodied space such that residents of the neighbourhood could be identifiable from outsiders. Such a process of in-forming and embodiment sets a common ground for social acceptance, sense of familiarity, and facilitates social interaction among residents who have developed common norms and values over time

Perspectives of gated communities’ socio-spatial integration: the case of post-socialist Lithuania

as a new style of residential development, gated communities appear to be a reflection of territorial and social segregation in the suburbs of post-socialist cities. Even though the phenomenon of gating is not prevalent in Lithuania, it still inheres spatial segregation as a precondition. Researches in Lithuania have shown that, despite strong segregating effect, in some cases gated communities may have an ambiguous impact on the population outside such settlements. A complex evaluation of this integration process, conducted via a three-dimensional integration model, as well as an examination of the psychological, social, economic and barrier factors of gated communities' impacts, may ascertain the directions and perspectives of possible integration thereof. It is likely that the promotion of those prominent effects and the search for new ones can lead gated communities to become more positive for society as a whole and achieve stronger integration in suburban areas.Gated Communities als die neue Wohnungsform reflektiert die territoriale und soziale Segregation in den Vororten auf postsozialistischen Städten. Obwohl dieses Phänomen in Litauen nicht sehr verbreitet ist, schafft es dennoch die Voraussetzungen für sozialräumliche Segregation. Die Forschungen in Litauen haben gezeigt, dass Gated Communities nicht nur Segregationseffekts aber mehrdeutige Auswirkungen auf die Bevölkerung außerhalb dieser Siedlungen haben können. Die komplexe Bewertung des Integrationsprozesses durch dreidimensionales Integrationsmodell und Psychologische-, Soziale-, Ökonomische- und Barrierefaktoren des Einflusses kann Richtungen und Perspektiven einer möglichen Integration bestimmen. Es ist wahrscheinlich, dass die Förderung dieser bekannten Effekte und die Suche nach neuen Möglichkeiten für die gesamte Gesellschaft positiver werden und stärkere Integration in Vorstadtgebieten erreichen kann

Writing the Latin American city: Trajectories of urban scholarship

Scholarship on urban Latin America is prolific and multifaceted. The region not only is the most urbanised in the world but also the most unequal. This distinctive feature makes it rich and relevant for urban theory-making. This essay introduces a Virtual Special Issue (VSI) on urban studies in Latin America that showcases a selection of articles from the journal’s archives from the mid-1970s to the present. It aims to locate urban studies scholarship in/about the region in the context of democratisation struggles and their urban implications. On the one hand, it traces the intellectual trajectories of some key urban debates bringing attention to their disciplinary, methodological and theoretical underpinnings. The VSI identifies four well-established strands: (1) Disputes around local governance; (2) Anatomy of uneven urbanisation; (3) Housing provision landscapes and infrastructural assemblages; and (4) Economic geographies and variegated gentrifications. On the other hand, it delineates a broad picture of the emergent debates and thematic, methodological and geographical absences in the pages of this journal. Through this analysis, the editorial concludes by identifying some potentially productive future directions for research

Socio-Economic Segregation and Income Inequality:

This book attempts to get a true global overview of trends in urban inequality and residential socio-economic segregation in a large number of cities all over the world. It investigates the link between income inequality and socio-economic residential segregation in 24 large urban regions in Africa, Asia, Australia, Europe, North America and South America. In many ways the book is a sequel to the earlier book “Socio-Economic Segregation in European Capital Cities” which focussed solely on trends in Europe. Although that book was very well received, readers also asked whether trends in Europe were representative for what is happening in the rest of the world. This new book is a direct response to that question and aims to be more globally representative. The main outcome of this book is the proposal of a Global Segregation Thesis, which combines ideas of rising levels of inequality, rising levels of socio-economic segregation, and important changes in the social geography of cities. At the time of writing this preface, the world is still grappling with the global outbreak of COVID-19. Now the spread of the virus is slowing down in the Global North, the Global South is hit very hard. In response to the spread of the virus, unprecedented measures were taken, having a huge impact on the world economy. It is widely expected that these measures will lead to a deep economic crisis, which will hit those who are the most vulnerable hardest. Some of the chapters in this book mention the COVID-19 crisis, and it is expected that this crisis will speed up the increase in inequality, both globally and locally, leading to an accelerated growth in socio-economic segregation in cities. This book would not have been possible without the generous contributions from author teams from all over the world. We are very grateful for their generosity and their contributions. Much of the editorial time invested in this book was covered by funding from the European Research Council under the European Union’s Seventh Framework Program (FP/2007-2013)/ERC Grant Agreement n.615159 (ERC Consolidator Grant DEPRIVEDHOODS, Socio-spatial inequality, deprived neighbourhoods and neighbourhood effects); from the Estonian Research Council (PUT PRG306, Infotechnological Mobility Laboratory, RITA-Ränne), and from TU Delft where Tiit Tammaru was a visiting professor in 2018

A mall for all? Race and public space in post-apartheid Cape Town

International audienceThis article analyses post-apartheid public spaces through social and spatial practices at the Victoria & Alfred (V&A) Waterfront mall in Cape Town. Our empirical evidence suggests that these public spaces involve much more than just consumption patterns, as they sustain and support novel ways of asserting social identities in a new political situation. These changes are, however, quite complex and fraught with ambivalence. Consequently, we scrutinize how race is staged in that space, and how racial diversity produces various kinds of boundaries. We then argue that these urban practices lead us to an understanding of the precarious balance between private and public spaces. We propose the notion of `publicization' -- the process whereby private spaces acquire a more public dimension

The dynamics of international migration and settlement in Europe: a state of the art

A fundamental issue in society today, migration has been undergoing a new dynamic transformation, calling for new policy approaches. This new dynamic is not yet understood clearly, let alone that adequate policy answers for 'the managing' of these new migration processes and the consequences for receiving and sending societies are within. This comprehensive overview of migration research conducted throughout the IMISCoe network of European research analyses the influx of various types of immigrants in Western Europe post World War II, mostly to large cities, as well as the reactions of the native populations and governments to the changes and pressures brought about by immigration