The management of disadvantaged neighbourhoods: theoretical approaches for analysing state action

Abstract

Many problems that haunt national societies (unemployment, crime, inter-ethnic tensions) are experienced first and most intensely in disadvantaged urban neighbourhoods. It is therefore not surprising that European governments have developed a range of territorial policies that focus specifically on these neighbourhoods. Policies that are not strictly territorial - health, crime, etc. - are increasingly coordinated on a neighbourhood level. What makes policies towards neighbourhoods 'special' is that they are situated at the interface of the social and the physical. As architecture, spatial planning, and physical decay affect crime and social dislocation, the obvious answer to many social problems seems to be urban renewal. Yet, the effects of urban renewal are far from clear, and large scale physical restructuring places neighbourhoods at risk for further social deterioration. Finally, inner city neighbourhoods have become a prime site for experiments in participatory democracy; some sponsored by local governments, some initiated by residents themselves. Again, the argument is that by giving residents more direct influence over the management of their environment will result in a reduction of crime and dislocation. In short, inner city neighbourhoods have become a focal point of a variety of social trends, policy initiatives, and trends in democratisation. This session starts from the observation that the causes and consequences of this development - the rise of the neighbourhood as the locus of social developments, trends in democratisation, and neighbourhoods as a prime scale for state action - have so far been ill understood. The few analyses that scrutinise policies towards urban neighbourhoods are usually not informed by theories that do justice to the complex crosscurrents that characterize inner city neighbourhoods. In an attempt to rectify this omission, this session draws together different theoretical perspectives that might be helpful for understanding both the causes and consequences of the popularity of the neighbourhood as a site for state intervention. The different perspectives provide specific lenses through which we can observe and understand processes that have so far largely escaped the attention of urbanists, social theorists, and policy scholars.

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