Comment 103825

By RobF (registered) | Posted August 08, 2014 at 14:25:18 in reply to Comment 103810

Well, I had a lengthy reply written, but I managed to lose it before posting it (the keyboard on my laptop has button for moving backward or forward on the web next to the cursor).

Probably, better i didn't send it. I think we're on the same side. Our differences more nuanced than a comment board back-and-forth allows. For example, I share a certain dislike for simplistic renderings of gentrification. The process is complicated and the causes and outcomes variegated. It is not an everywhere, all the time, same process, and gentrifiers themselves occupy a range of social class positions, if you look at it in those terms. I think what the literature is clear about is that security of tenure impacts whether you benefit ... there is a big difference between a renter that is evicted when a house is converted from rental to owner-occupation, and a homeowner who can choose to stay or sell. Security of tenure doesn't have to relate solely to ownership, but in practice in most cities it does, and speculators have been know to use creative stratagems for clearing out existing tenants in order to renovate or otherwise move their properties upmarket. The process is also not instant, it unfolds over time, as stage models of gentrification outline. I'll have to read the article you referenced carefully and see where it fits in the literature.

I really don't have the time to properly respond to the rest of your argument, but i will say there are no essential ways that cities have operated for 10,000 years. There are certain attributes or characteristics that make cities a distinctive form of human settlement, and axioms that seem to explain how they work (your essential urban economies of scale, agglomeration, density, association, and extension). But how they play out in terms of everyday life, form, and function has been quite varied across time and space. It is simplistic to point to them absent any reference to property regimes, institutional forms, social structure, culture norms, etc. We live under capitalism, so our cities and urban regions operate and are shaped by a different logic than cities of other historical periods (there are profound differences in how space is organized and valued under different political-economic systems).

Comment edited by RobF on 2014-08-08 14:25:42

Permalink | Context

Events Calendar

There are no upcoming events right now.
Why not post one?

Recent Articles

Article Archives

Blog Archives

Site Tools

Feeds