WHAT SCALE MATTERS? EXPLORING THE RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN INDIVIDUALS' SOCIAL POSITION,NEIGHBOURHOOD CONTEXT AND THE SCALE OF NEIGHBOURHOOD

Over the past few years, neighbourhood effects research has received significant attention from the academic world, not only in the US, where that attention has a longer tradition, but also in Western Europe. There is also substantial interest among policy makers. Most policy makers intend to reduce concentrations of poverty by enhancing the social mix of neighbourhoods. Avoiding high immigrant concentrations in particular neighbourhoods is another issue that fuels political debate and policy intervention in many Western European countries, Scandinavian countries included. However, there are clear gaps in the understanding of the relationship between neighbourhood composition and social outcomes. One of these gaps regards the scale of the neighbourhood; if there would be neighbourhood effects, what scale is it relevant to consider? Is mix good or bad for the social prospects of individuals at a level that is very local, for example a few neighbouring streets, or could mix be helpful at a somewhat higher scale? This article will focus on this issue, applying individual longitudinal data in multi‐level models for the entire active population of the three largest metropolitan areas in Sweden. We will explore the degree to which the social and ethnic composition of geographical districts, at a variety of scales (measured at time t), are statistically related to individual employment and earnings for adult metropolitan residents at time t+1, controlling for relevant personal and household characteristics.     

Acculturation and ethnic survival?

?The so‐called ?Norwegianization? of the Sami population in parts of North‐Norway has been described in rather broad terms as a process towards a more or less complete assimilation of the minority group. However, the study of this process affronts some methodological problems. Being a process of recodification of basic identities, we ideally need data on how members of the different ethnic categories perceived each other and what impact these mutual codifications had on their organization of social interaction at different points in time. No records of the past contain this sort of information. However, through the study of population censuses we may compare the registration of ?nationality? over time, and when we trace individuals in these registrations, we also find that changes of category occur rather frequently. The category of ?mixed? descent tends to increase, and this may be due to changes in registrations and/ or growth in the rate of inter‐ethnic marriages. After this methodological illustration, the article discusses mechanisms of ethnic differentiation in seemingly ?Norwegianized? communities of today, namely dialect variations (conversational codes) as a means to sustain ethnic categorization on a regional level and presents an example of local level incorporation which may be seen as an extension of ethnic dichotomization in this type of community.?     

REPRODUCING AND RESHAPING ETHNIC RESIDENTIAL SEGREGATION IN STOCKHOLM: THE ROLE OF SELECTIVE MIGRATION MOVES

This paper deals with the issues of selective migration moves, and the production and reproduction of immigrantdense neighbourhoods in Stockholm, Sweden. It has been shown earlier that selective migration, that is, socioeconomic and ethnic differences between those leaving, entering and staying in so‐called deprived neighbourhoods, reproduces these neighbourhoods' characteristics of being poor and immigrant dense. Key concepts launched to inform such studies and derived from the US segregation discourse are “white fight” and “white avoidance”, meaning that native people (or white people in the US case) tend to leave neighbourhoods experiencing growing numbers of immigrants (black people) and which they also tend to avoid moving into such neighbourhoods. Using a complete set of geo‐coded longitudinal individual data for the 2005–2008 Stockholm County population, this paper contributes to our understanding of ethnic differences in the intra‐urban migration system. Three empirical questions are addressed: what individual characteristics distinguish (1) those who move into neighbourhoods experiencing rapidly increasing immigrant densities from those moving elsewhere in the urban region; (2) those who leave neighbourhoods experiencing rapidly increasing immigrant densities from those who stay put; (3) those who move in the direction of higher immigrant densities from those moving into lower densities? Results from multivariate statistical analyses provide support for the avoidance hypothesis but less support for the fight hypothesis. When controlling for a range of individual and neighbourhood attributes there is clear evidence that native‐born Swedes are less inclined than most immigrant categories to move into immigrant dense areas while ethnic origin does not seem to matter much when explaining who leaves such areas.     

‘Any place to raise children is a good place’: children,housing and neighbourhoods in inner Newcastle,Australia

Neighbourhoods are important spaces of interaction for children. This paper explores the perceptions of residents from seven suburbs in the inner area of Newcastle, Australia concerning what makes a good neighbourhood for children. Key factors identified by residents include the types of dwellings found in the neighbourhood (with detached houses being seen as preferable for children) and the quality of neighbourhood resources. Another important feature was social interactions within the neighbourhood, including interactions between children and adults and interactions between groups of children. The paper examines how different features of neighbourhoods interact to create adult perceptions about whether a neighbourhood is appropriate for children. The paper also points to the ways that children are seen to actively produce the neighbourhood in which they live.     

Social and political trust in Istanbul and Moscow: a comparative analysis of individual and neighbourhood effects

Aiming to bring local context into studies of social capital, our study uses samples of 4006 individuals in Istanbul and 3476 in Moscow using a comparable questionnaire. The stratification of each city's neighbourhoods on the basis of socio-economic characteristics provided the basis for the sampling. Using a multilevel modelling procedure, we show both that locality matters (neighbourhood effect proved significant) and that social capital may indeed be constituted in very particular ways in illiberal democracies such as Russia and Turkey. Social and political trust are frequently thought to contribute to social capital – that is, to provide social resources upon which individuals or groups may draw for their political efficacy. Trust in fellow citizens in Istanbul exhibits a positive relationship to associational activities (joining clubs etc.), while in Moscow social trust can be explained predominantly in terms of (lower) socio-economic status. At the same time, important similarities emerged between the two cases. For social trust, in both cities the 'cosmopolitanization thesis', which holds that those who associate more widely are also more trusting of fellow citizens, generally applied. Further, in both cities, residents with lower socio-economic status (though in Moscow this is complicated by education) and lower likelihoods of engagement in direct political action were more trustful of parliament . While this is the opposite of what we have been led to expect based on Western democratic polities, it is a reasonable outcome of illiberal democratic governance operating in these two cities.     

Anchoring of Firms in the Neighbourhood: Does Local Social and Physical Order Affect Local Firms' Investment Strategies?

An increasing number of small- and medium-sized firms, whose low relocation propensity seems to point to strong local anchors, have moved to residential neighbourhoods. On the one hand, the neighbourhood context, an attractive production milieu with rich social network potential, may enable entrepreneurs to increase investments in either human capital (personnel) or physical capital (premises, production goods). These investments further anchor firms in a neighbourhood, where they contribute to a thriving local economy. On the other hand, high crime rates, a deteriorated physical environment and a lack of social capital can discourage entrepreneurs from investing locally. In this study, we conducted a multilevel analysis on the relative contribution of neighbourhood characteristics to entrepreneurial investment strategies and controlled for firm and entrepreneur characteristics. We found that neighbourhood cohesiveness and liveability—but not local market characteristics—make a small but significant contribution to explaining local entrepreneurs' investments. This contribution is even stronger for the smallest firms. Therefore, a spatially targeted policy aimed at improving social cohesion and safety is likely to benefit both residents and small local firms.     

What “Is” Territorial Cohesion? What Does It “Do”?: Essentialist Versus Pragmatic Approaches to Using Concepts

The question, “what is territorial cohesion” has reverberated through European spatial policy since the publication of the European Spatial Development Perspective in 1999. Over the last 10 years, the European Spatial Policy Observation Network (ESPON) has made many efforts to define and measure the concept of “territorial cohesion”. Many such attempts assume that a policy concept must be defined in order to be “operationalized”. Or, in other words, that we must determine what the concept is before we can determine what it can or should do. This paper challenges this assumption in two parts. In the first, I review a number of ESPON projects to show how complex and uncertain these essentialist definitions have become. In the second, I analyse a number of national, regional and local government responses to the 2008 Green paper. I show that, whilst a clear and coherent definition has not been established, this concept is already operationalized in different policy frameworks. Bringing this together, I argue that users of such concepts ought to approach the issue differently, through a pragmatic line of enquiry: one that asks what territorial cohesion does, what it might do and how it might affect what other concepts, practices and materials do.     

Tacit differences,ethnicity and neoliberalism: Polish migrant mothers in German cities

This article presents an inquiry into which tacit differences are relevant for how people make sense of encounters with others in urban settings, and how, if at all, they are translated into ethnic categories understood as ‘basic operators’ in everyday life. Drawing from our interviews with twenty Polish mothers living in Berlin and Munich, we argue that what our research participants distinguish as ‘typically Polish’ or ‘typically German’ is not necessarily connected to some ethnically specific ways of working or mothering, but, rather, significantly structured by locally specific forms of neoliberalism. By asking what kind of difference becomes understood as ethnic difference and how this process of demarcation occurs, this article adds to the strand of intersectional approaches that theorise the notion of difference, recognise heterogeneity of individual categories and render them suspect.     

‘We want to be there for everyone’: imagined spaces of encounter and the politics of place in a super-diverse neighbourhood

In the context of increasingly diverse urban populations in European cities, neighbourhood organizations are often seen as offering spaces of encounter that can foster a sense of belonging. As a result, they have formed an important element in urban policies on community identity and social cohesion. Yet everyday encounters in such micro-publics may not necessarily be experienced as positive, and these spaces themselves might become sites of contestation and exclusion. Through an ethnographic study in a super-diverse neighbourhood in Amsterdam, The Netherlands, this paper investigates how residents’ sense of belonging to the neighbourhood is informed by competing claims on a neighbourhood centre. Although envisioned as a collective space, contestations between different groups of residents over the centre as a functional and meaningful place illustrate how governing institutions shape informal politics of place through their own vision for the neighbourhood and their selective support of some initiatives over others.     

CITIES AND DEVELOPMENT

ABSTRACT This paper starts with a “primer” on what we know about the conceptual and empirical links between development and urbanization. While historical experience of developed countries is reviewed, today's rapid urbanization in developing countries offers an intense set of challenges. Rapid urbanization requires massive population movements and enormous local and inter‐city infrastructure investments in a modern context of heavy government interventions in economies. This context raises under‐researched issues, discussed in the second part of the paper. First concerns the spatial form of development. How much development should be focused in mega‐cities, or huge urban clusters, as opposed to being more spatially dispersed, a critical question facing China and India today? How do we conceptualize and measure both the benefits and costs of increased urban concentration; and how are they linked to a country's evolving national industrial composition? Second, what is the evolution of spatial income inequality under massive rural‐urban migration? Is inequality heightened today relative to the past by national government policies which “favor” certain cities and regions and by local government policies in those cities that may try to deflect migrants by offering them poor living conditions?     

Un pasteur actuaire? Ordre de la mortalité, durée de la vie et rentes viagères dansL’Ordre divin de Johann Peter Süssmilch

The government of Providence builds the order which pastor Süßmilch sees in the demographic events and especially the order of mortality. God governs the length of human life and assigns to each person a just balance between fear of death and expectation of life. This authorizes Süßmilch to clarify the notions of probable life and life expectancy with the design to treat of their main application in the field of political arithmetic, that is the computations of Government loans under the form of annuities on lives. So he treats of an important question which concerns the history of actuarial calculation as well as the history of probability, of statistics and demography. We cannot forget also the political and philosophical points of view which the pastor underlines vividly: what sort of contract joins the individual together with the State? And, above all, what sort of contract joins the creature and his God? This study of the contingent but optimal regularities which Providence makes in the world builds an important contribution to the physico-theological current.     

Health hazards and socio-economic status: a neighbourhood cohort approach, Vancouver, 1976–2001

This paper lays the foundation for a research program concerned with the geographical patterning of environmental and population health at the urban neighbourhood scale. Based on the Vancouver metropolitan region, the aim is to better understand the role of neighbourhoods as epidemiological spaces where environmental and social characteristics combine as health processes and outcomes at the community and individual levels. With respect to procedure, this paper builds a cohort of commensurate neighbourhoods across all six census periods from 1976 to 2001, assembles neighbourhood air pollution (total particles) data, and provides an initial analysis to demonstrate how air pollution systematically and consistently maps onto neighbourhood socio-economic markers, specifically education and family status. We conclude with a discussion of how the neighbourhood cohort can be further developed to address emergent priorities in the population and environmental health literatures, namely the need for temporally matched data, a life-course approach and analyses that control for spatial scale effects.     

A tale of three cities: negotiating ethnic identity and acculturation in northwest China

Through extensive interviews with Hui, Han, Dongxiang, and Tibetan migrants and participant observation in northwest China between 2013 and 2015, we examine how the negotiation of ethnic identity influences acculturation strategies in three cultural contexts by scrutinizing the three operational aspects of ethnic identity: perceptions, affections, and behaviors. We argue that the ethnic identity is negotiated at both the group and individual levels as a relation of dialectical unification in regard to fixity and fluidity. At the group level, ethnic identity is relatively fixed and rigid and is perceived by most of the group members as the social norms which normalize ethnic behavior collectively. At the individual level, on the other hand, ethnic identity can be highly flowing and contested from one individual to another. Han identity is generally self-perceived as unmarked, porous, situated, and sometimes even vacuous. Han migrants’ acculturation is more dependent on the cultural context of the host society. Hui and Dongxiang migrants show a strong attachment and affective bonds to their ethnic identity, which is largely based on religious identity. Although Tibetan migrants perceive a complex, place-based identity related to their religion, the grassland, their traditional ways of living, and their language, a Tibetan identity seems to be difficult to fulfill given their economic vulnerability and the contradictions between retaining traditions and being Sinicized in the city.     

Local press,dispersal and community in the construction of asylum debates

How has the prominent and contentious international issue of asylum been debated at a local level; what local variations are there and why? This paper presents analysis of local newspapers and interviews with press workers for Cardiff and Leeds, two UK case study locations that have received asylum seekers through the dispersal policy. The case studies show that asylum is framed and constructed differently by the local press in different places with implications for reactions to asylum seekers and community cohesion. The relations between local press and community are explored as explanations for varying discourses. It is found that the way the local press represents and constructs local identity sets the framework for reactions to dispersal; and that the operation of the local press within local networks of power and information shapes the extent to which established discourses can be challenged. For Cardiff, the localising of asylum through the dispersal policy created an opportunity for local negotiation of difference in the context of the national moral panic on asylum.     

Photography,public pedagogy and the politics of place-making in post-industrial areas

This paper discusses the way in which public photographic depictions of places and place-based communities contribute to the construction of local identity and community building. Being public and visualised statements about what a place and the people living there are and what they are not, photographs incite public debate about place and community. The paper discusses two interventions, one in Ghent, Belgium, involving professional photographers from outside the neighbourhood, and one in Bonnybridge, Scotland, involving amateur photography by local residents. Both are attempts by community workers to encourage citizens to discuss alternative realities of themselves, their neighbours and their neighbourhood. Starting from theories of place-making and public pedagogy, we reveal how both nonetheless exemplify very different strategies to democratise community-building processes.     

The Adaptative Nature of Neoliberalism at the Local Scale: Fifteen Years of City Improvement Districts in Cape Town and Johannesburg

Abstract: By unravelling the adoption and adaptation of the North American Business Improvement District (BID) model in South African cities, this paper considers the way neoliberal principles are making their way in the post‐apartheid context. Drawing on a comparative approach of BIDs in Johannesburg and Cape Town, we analyse the tensions and conflicts surrounding their implementation and unpack the resilience of this model. As unexpected as this resilience might be in such a context, that is, far away from the heartland of neoliberalism, we argue that this resilience is linked to the permeability of the local contexts and to the plasticity of the model itself at the city and neighbourhood levels, reflecting a capacity to adapt to inherited regulatory frameworks, patterns of territorial development and embedded socio‐political alliances of the local terrains, as well as an ability to accommodate post‐apartheid issues through the crafting of what we refer to as “local Third Ways”.     

Ethnic Inequalities in the Public Sector: A Comparative Analysis

This article uses empirical data to discuss the links between ethnicity, inequality and governance in a framework that divides countries according to their levels of ethnic polarization. It makes three main arguments. First, types of diversity, not the existence of diversity per se, explain potentials for conflict or cohesion in multiethnic societies. Ethnic cleavages are configured differently in different social structures and are less conflictual in some countries than in others. Second, relative balance has been achieved in the public sectors of countries that are highly fragmented or those with ethnicity‐sensitive policies, but not in those with ethnicity‐blind policies. Third, the article is critical of institutional approaches to conflict management that underplay background conditions in shaping choices. Consociational arrangements may not be relevant in unipolar ethnic settings or fragmented multiethnic societies, where governments may be ethnically inclusive under democratic conditions. They seem unavoidable in ethnic settings with two or three main groups or in settings with strong ethnic/regional clusters.     

Discourse on migration and ethnic identity: interviews with professionals in Hong Kong

"This paper has revealed a complex set of relationships between migration, place and ethnic identity [in Hong Kong]. On the one hand, ethnic identity is shaped by the places where people have lived, particularly the places where they have spent the early years of their life; on the other [hand], places--being the context for socialization--provide the milieux where people learn who and what they are and how to act...." The authors note that "while legislation clearly regulates levels of immigration, international migration is also self-regulated by potential migrants in relation to interpretations of their ethnic identities and their perceptions of 'other' places."     

人文地理学研究中对空间的再认识

作为人文地理学的核心概念,空间在全球化、信息化、人文主义、后现代主义、地理学社会与文化转向等语境下需要重新认识。首先对空间认知转变的背景进行阐释,在此基础上重点辨析国内外研究成果中对于"空间"的核心论述,把对空间的认知转变归结为4点:(1)从科学的空间到人性的空间;(2)从物质的空间到非物质的空间;(3)单纯的空间到复杂的空间;(4)从"外壳"的空间到空间里面的空间。最后提出对我国当前人文地理学研究的3点启示:(1)注重学科基础概念的重新认识;(2)重视微观层面的细化研究;(3)加强跨学科的整合研究。     

Industrial spaces for grassroots creative production: spatial,social and planning facets

Former industrial premises provide material and symbolic resources for grassroots creative production, but planning is complex as these sites are transitory and excessive intervention may stifle creativity. This paper analyses the transformations of La Ribera (Bilbao), a mixed-use peninsula waiting to be redeveloped, where, in the meantime, creative-based grassroots projects have settled. Drawing upon relevant planning documents, documentary material and interviews with key actors, the paper explores (i) the spatial and built form advantages of these spaces, (ii) their impact on neighbourhood life and (iii) the contradictions faced in the planning process. The analysis suggests that spatiality plays a critical role, but it is threatened by market pressures, local governments’ interest to encourage the city's reputation and neighbours’ mistrust for the changes they may trigger. As a result, we contend that art spaces’ institutionalization in the neighbourhood is decisive for their sustainability, but the conflicts that arise for the symbolic appropriation of space should be considered. Regarding policy, governance approaches that preserve users’ autonomy and spaces’ built form and atmospheric qualities are rather suitable responses if they are part of a comprehensive agenda that includes local socio-economic conditions and neighbours’ aspirations.