W.P.C. van Gent

Disentangling neighbourhood problems: Area-based interventions in Western European cities

Urban policies in Western Europe have increasingly taken a territorial focus in addressing social problems through area-based initiatives (ABIs). Policy discourses emphasise the role of the residential environment in the social economic deprivation. However, a territorial focus that tackles both place-based issues and people-based problems would only make sense either when a ‘critical representation’ of the target population resides in several areas in an already divided city, or when neighbourhood effects take place. In the European context, the existence of either scenario is not a matter of fact. Our overview of four urban policies reveals that even though the rhetoric makes multiple allusions to the existence of the two scenarios, there is no convincing evidence. Moreover, in some cases the evidence refutes policy assumptions. This means that the policies are merely tackling unrelated problems: people-based social economic deprivation and place-based liveability and housing issues. In addition, urban policies stand against a backdrop of social and cultural integration debates. It is unknown what the territorial focus will do for integration, but it is unlikely that ABIs will be successful in effectively tackling social economic deprivation in European societies.

Puzzling patterns in neighborhood change: upgrading and downgrading in highly regulated urban housing markets

This study disentangles the relationship between income and real estate value development in Dutch urban neighborhoods. Within the literature on upgrading and downgrading, it is often assumed that neighborhood income and real estate value development are strongly linked. The results reported here—based on research in Amsterdam, The Hague, and Tilburg—indicate that income and real estate values develop simultaneously in only a relatively small number of neighborhoods, which are at the top and bottom of the housing market hierarchy. The majority reveal a more complex relationship: a number of neighborhoods show a time lag between the trends, whereas in other neighborhoods income and real estate values show partially diverging trends. Several tentative explanations are offered for the complex relationship, and stress the importance of place-specific knowledge. Three points of attention are suggested for further research: understanding the role of household dynamics, the position of neighborhoods within their urban system, and the role of the state and housing associations in neighborhood change.

Housing Policy as a Lever for Change? The Politics of Welfare, Assets and Tenure

The housing tenure structure has long been associated with different forms of welfare state capitalism in Western Europe. However, with the rise of owner-occupancy, this association has not been so straightforward. An alternative view is to view housing policies that promote owner-occupancy for households to acquire assets, as an attempt by the state to reform social welfare systems. The politics of welfare reform are related to the discourses of homeownership ideology. The ownership of (housing) assets agenda serves as a means to change the relationship between state, market and individual households. This view is mostly based on the British experience and this paper seeks to broaden it by examining the Netherlands and Spain. The paper shows differences, but also that housing policies play an important role in driving towards or maintaining market-dominated solutions. Housing is used to either reorient towards or maintain a welfare system where asset ownership and market dependency is deemed more appropriate than secure income and public expenditure.The housing tenure structure has long been associated with different forms of welfare state capitalism in Western Europe. However, with the rise of owner-occupancy, this association has not been so straightforward. An alternative view is to view housing policies that promote owner-occupancy for households to acquire assets, as an attempt by the state to reform social welfare systems. The politics of welfare reform are related to the discourses of homeownership ideology. The ownership of (housing) assets agenda serves as a means to change the relationship between state, market and individual households. This view is mostly based on the British experience and this paper seeks to broaden it by examining the Netherlands and Spain. The paper shows differences, but also that housing policies play an important role in driving towards or maintaining market-dominated solutions. Housing is used to either reorient towards or maintain a welfare system where asset ownership and market dependency is deemed more appropr...

Class, migrants, and the European city: spatial impacts of structural changes in early twenty-first century Amsterdam

ABSTRACT Prevailing Anglo-Saxon theories on urban segregation based on class and ‘migrant-status’ have often been rejected for continental European cities, mainly because of different economic and labour market structures and higher levels of state interventions and welfare support in the latter type of cities. As urban economies in continental Europe are growing ever more global and welfare states are in continuous restructuring we seek to investigate whether a typical European socially balanced migrant city, the city (and metropolitan region) of Amsterdam, is developing into the direction of a more outspoken ‘double dual’ condition with populations getting more spatially segregated in terms of class and migrant status. This study looks at developments in terms of the spatial dynamics of the ‘native’ and immigrant population of different classes. We find that the region is undergoing a transformation, which for now reduces spatial concentrations and inequality. As the urban core is gentrifying and some suburban neighbourhoods are declining, the typical dichotomy of a poor-migrant central city versus affluent-native suburbs is vanishing. These developments point to a different type of social-migrant city, one with a patchwork of residential milieus along social and cultural lines. However, we challenge the sustainability of that patchwork over time.

Political reactions to the euro crisis: cross-national variations and rescaling issues in elections and popular protests

In this paper, we explore the different political responses to the euro crisis among European publics since the financial crisis in Europe started in 2008 by concentrating on the two most important organizational vehicles in a democratic polity: political parties and social movements. We examine the political geography of possible shifts in support patterns for competing parties at national elections (in the member states where they have been held) and the geographical distribution of popular protests related to the crisis in 2011–2012. Finally, we address the risks of democratic deterioration by comparing current developments with the interwar period.

Normalizing urban inequality : Cinematic imaginaries of difference in postcolonial Amsterdam = Normalisation de l’inégalité urbaine: imaginaires cinématiques de la différence dans l’Amsterdam postcolonial = La normalización de la desigualdad urbana: imaginarios cinematográficos de diferencia en la Ámsterdam poscolonial

Abstract Combining insights from critical urban studies with geographies of race and racism, this article examines the role of spatial imaginaries in normalizing urban inequalities, showing how such imaginaries make the associations between places and populations appear natural. We extend analyses of the interplay between material landscapes and imaginative geographies to examine how these connections feature in processes of gentrification and displacement and emphasize the necessity of an intersectional approach in understanding the cultural underpinnings of urban change. We propose that such analyses of dominant spatial imaginaries benefit from attention to their colonial roots, given the persistence of monomythical explorer-hero narratives and the mapping of reworked colonial imaginative geographies onto contemporary postcolonial cities. Our analysis focuses on Amsterdam, the popular Dutch film Alleen Maar Nette Mensen and the spatiality of difference that its ‘monomyth’ narrative presents. It justifies an unequal urban order by contrasting Amsterdam’s city centre, which is depicted as White, middle-class and ‘civilized’, with the post-war urban periphery, which is cast as a mysterious place of racialized poverty, squalor and pathological behaviour. This culturally essentialist depiction contributes to the depoliticization of state-led gentrification and normalizes changes to the material cityscape.

Normalizing urban inequality

Abstract Combining insights from critical urban studies with geographies of race and racism, this article examines the role of spatial imaginaries in normalizing urban inequalities, showing how such imaginaries make the associations between places and populations appear natural. We extend analyses of the interplay between material landscapes and imaginative geographies to examine how these connections feature in processes of gentrification and displacement and emphasize the necessity of an intersectional approach in understanding the cultural underpinnings of urban change. We propose that such analyses of dominant spatial imaginaries benefit from attention to their colonial roots, given the persistence of monomythical explorer-hero narratives and the mapping of reworked colonial imaginative geographies onto contemporary postcolonial cities. Our analysis focuses on Amsterdam, the popular Dutch film Alleen Maar Nette Mensen and the spatiality of difference that its ‘monomyth’ narrative presents. It justifies an unequal urban order by contrasting Amsterdam’s city centre, which is depicted as White, middle-class and ‘civilized’, with the post-war urban periphery, which is cast as a mysterious place of racialized poverty, squalor and pathological behaviour. This culturally essentialist depiction contributes to the depoliticization of state-led gentrification and normalizes changes to the material cityscape.

Surveying the Fault Lines in Social Tectonics; Neighbourhood Boundaries in a Socially-mixed Renewal Area

Abstract In recent decades, neighbourhood regeneration has often involved social mixing strategies, often through comprehensive renewal. By deconcentrating poverty and giving opportunities for social interaction, remaining residents are believed to benefit from middle-class presence. This study looks at a post-war neighbourhood in Amsterdam which has undergone comprehensive renewal. By making use of survey data in combination with GIS techniques, this study shows that perceptions are structured by physical characteristics, activity patterns and symbolic boundaries. These perceptions are highly dependent on social position. While some residents in renewal areas display inclusionary attitudes, there is also evidence of middle-class and lower class disaffiliation. Interestingly, these translate into different mental maps for both groups. The paper ends with a methodological reflection on using GIS-based boundary drawing in neighbourhood surveys to gauge fragmentation and place-based displacement.

Mixed communities: gentrification by stealth? [Review of: G. Bridge, T. Butler (2012) Mixed communities: gentrification by stealth?]

Encouraging neighbourhood social mix has been a major goal of urban policy and planning in a number of different countries. This book draws together a range of case studies by international experts to assess the impacts of social mix policies and the degree to which they might represent gentrification by stealth. Andrew Molloy thinks after fifty years of botched urban policies, the case studies featured in this book might provide a window of understanding into the full ramifications of urban social mix policies.

[Review of: J.W. Duyvendak (2011) The politics of home: belonging and nostalgia in Western Europe and the United States]

might deepen and given that more of the space in many cities is given over to the market and the private sector then the spatial forms will reflect this. There is much more I could say about this book. It is both interesting and frustrating. The author’s concern to challenge US/UK hegemony has I think proved to be a diversion and a confusion. There are too many strands of thought running through the book as well as some rather loose definitions and evidencing. In that regard it may be that his forthcoming book on sub-prime cities will be a more digested contribution with clearer lines of thought. His passion, abilities and commitment are very clear, and without doubt there are good books to come but for me this is not one of them.