Building the Inclusive City

Theory and Practice for Confronting Urban Segregation

Nilson Ariel Espino

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2015
• Print ISBN: 9781138814417
• eBook ISBN: 9781317601470
• Topic: Architecture
• Subtopic: Urban Planning & Landscaping

Urban segregation is one of the main challenges facing urban development around the globe. The usual outcome of many urban development patterns is an unequal social geography, with the urban poor living in large clusters that are remote, isolated, dangerous or unhealthy. The result is inequality in a number of dimensions of urban life, from deficient urban access, services or infrastructure to social isolation, neighbourhood violence, and lack of economic opportunity.

This book brings together debates on ethnic and economic segregation, combining theory and practical solutions to create a guide for those trying to understand and address urban segregation in any part of the world, and integrate ameliorating policies to contemporary urban development agendas.

Part I

Social power and urban space

1 Power and difference

We are usually concerned with urban segregation because we see it both as an expression and as a cause of social inequality. Today, it seems logical to us that social inequalities present themselves spatially in the form of neighborhoods or urban zones segregated by income or wealth. However, segregation and inequality diverge frequently in the historical and anthropological record. Some very unequal societies, for example, barely practiced any social segregation at all, so the relationship between the two has to be examined in some detail. That is the purpose of this part of the book. It starts at the more abstract level of social power, and then works its way to the spatial dimensions of the topic. As we shall see, a theoretical and historical overview of segregation can be very useful for grasping why and how we have segregation today, and what avenues are open for corrective measures.

The reality of power has, as one of its enabling variables, the fact that all societies recognize differences between their members. All societies distinguish between different “types” of people, even if these differences are circumscribed to the most basic distinctions of sex and age. Categories such as male or female, or child, adult and elder, are, for obvious biological reasons, a basic part of any society’s classificatory scheme. Societies also have a more or less complex distribution of “roles” or “functions” that are essential for the survival and reproduction of that particular group. In small-scale societies with very simple divisions of labor, such as aboriginal bands, the few defined roles may be divided mostly along the sexual and age axes. For example, hunting may be assigned mostly to the men, while gathering and cooking might be performed mostly by the women. In contrast, in modern societies, the list of distinct social “functions” or “roles” may be seemingly endless, and may have a looser connection with gender, or even age. Social roles, however, are a ubiquitous trait of any social group.

With roles and functions come identities. In our societies, being a lawyer, for example, not only means that you perform the work typical of “lawyers”, but that you are also recognized as belonging to the specific group of people called by that term. You are known as a “lawyer” on a permanent basis, regardless of how much legal work you actually do, or are doing at any specific moment. “Being” a lawyer (rather than simply working as one) is identified with a host of social characteristics and expectations, encompassing responsibilities, duties, lifestyle, income, personality, and many more. People have established expectations and images of what being a lawyer is, and are usually bewildered if the purported role-player doesn’t behave or look like one.

This point is important in order to avoid an excessively utilitarian view on social roles or functions. People are identified with an established social role because of what they do, but also because of the image they project. “Looking the part” is an essential component of many social roles. When we are introduced to a stranger in a party, we immediately gather some basic information, such as profession or place of origin, which allows us to place the person in our social universe. We might then “understand” why the person is dressed in that particular way, or has a certain demeanor. If we are told that the person is a banker, we immediately form a series of expectations about that person, even if they consist of mostly stereotypes (which are an inevitable part of social life) or are mostly subconscious (which is usually the case). For practical purposes, then, there is not much distance between social “role”, “function” or “identity”, since they work together and reinforce each other.

Of course, all societies have well-established procedures for assigning roles and functions. Not just anyone can become an architect, a judge, or a witchdoctor. Depending on the culture, social recognition for a specific role may demand such varied requirements as years of training and tests, identification of special talents, supernatural signs, or exceptional performance. Credentials, be they formal or informal, on paper or in mind, are usually obtained through very specific actions, and the transition to the role is itself marked through ceremonies of some sort. Anthropologists call these ceremonies “rites of passage”, and their use is also widespread across human societies.¹ Graduations and accreditation procedures are the rites of passage for modern professions, which relate mostly to the world of work. Other rites of passage mark the transitions of age (e.g., bar-mitzvahs, quinceaños) or sexual and romantic availability (e.g., weddings). In other words, the transitions to some social roles are more or less automatic and inevitable (such as becoming an adult), while others demand particular accomplishments. In both cases, however, the roles come with specific social expectations of behavior and performance.

The fact that roles and identities may vary in type and amount points to another relevant feature of social life: one person can have many roles and identities. Accordingly, she might be subject to different standards of conduct, depending on the particular reference group each role is related to. You may be known mostly as a parent in the context of your neighborhood or your children’s school, as an accountant in your work environment, or as the “funny aunt” at family events. In each role and environment, your conduct may vary somewhat, because your audience and your peers are different. This is especially true in modern, urban societies, where people can belong to many different social circles that are not necessarily connected to one another. The size of contemporary urban populations, and the diversity of economic and social life, makes this almost inevitable. In village societies, for example, where everyone is pretty much in contact with everyone else on a daily basis – be that in school, work or church – social identities tend to be less “fragmented”.

Note

1 Van Gennep, Arnold. 1960. The Rites of Passage. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.

2 Types of power

In the preceding chapter I introduced the fact that all societies produce and recognize different roles and identities for their members. I will now move forward by positing that these roles and identities are often ranked. In general, as anthropologist David Graeber points out, being a “person” always means being a specific kind of person, which also immediately means being ascribed certain forms and degrees of social power.¹

Extending a previous example, the fact that a particular person is a lawyer not only indicates a distinct function in society, but also a certain degree of power. His or her education, for example, may guarantee a higher social status than the one enjoyed by those who never got past high school or elementary. If used strategically, the law degree may serve as a trampoline for public office, for example, or may land you on a television program as an “expert”, thus guaranteeing more public exposure and admiration. A lawyer’s income is also typically higher than that of other working people in general, and of other professionals in particular. In other words, being a “lawyer” usually entails more money and status, a fact that is widely recognized in our contemporary societies.

The reason behind the higher earnings and status accruing to certain professions or social roles is, however, not always transparent or easy to justify. There is not always a proportional relationship between the power (monetary and otherwise) attached to certain roles and the “value” of their services to society (if we take a utilitarian view of things), and issues of culture and simple group bargaining power always play a part. Some social roles are accorded lower status for no practical or moral reason (according to our current values, at least), like the low status suffered by girls and women in many societies for the simple fact of not being male. It is frequently argued that the value of the services provided by teachers or nurses, for example, is widely out of proportion to their incomes relative to other professions and, in fact, this can even be numerically assessed: a recent study estimated that a good kindergarten teacher could be worth as much as $320,000 a year based on the extra earnings accruing to the pupils when they reach adulthood.² In our capitalist societies, more money usually flows to those professions and activities that contribute more directly to the profits of private corporations, usually at the expense of those whose contributions may seem (from this vantage point) more indirect and remote – like child rearing or public service – even if they are equally or more essential for social welfare.³

Before delving further into how societies establish or deal with power differentials among their members, it would be convenient to examine the concept of power itself. What is power, after all? Max Weber, one of the fathers of modern sociology, defined it very broadly as the capacity that an individual has to impose his or her own will in a social relationship or, in other words, to influence the actions of others even when resisted.⁴ There are many ways this can be accomplished, and the study of different forms of power in society has been an intellectual preoccupation for the social sciences for quite some time.

As everyone knows, in contemporary societies the most effective way to “get your way” is through the possession of money. Money not only buys things, but also services and (unfortunately) political favors. One could say that money is currently the most universal power medium. This is a very recent phenomenon in human history, however. In a not-so-distant past, when many people worldwide still lived in simpler economies, with basic necessities met largely by the household or the village, and trade being an infrequent activity, money had a limited capacity to confer influence, mostly because there was not much you could buy with it. Other forms of power, such as social esteem or fame, were far more critical, and many of these other modalities are still with us, even if in diminished form. The sociologist Pierre Bourdieu has produced a very useful classificatory scheme of power (partly derived from Weber) that can help us navigate this topic.⁵

For Bourdieu, there are three forms of “capital”, the term he uses for power. “Economic capital” consists of money or material resources, which is now the “dominant” form. “Social capital” consists of social prestige or “honor”.⁶ Finally, “cultural capital” is education, knowledge or “culture” (in the sense of erudition). The social class of a person, or his or her location in the power structure of a society, is determined by the relative amounts of each form of capital that the p...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Half Title page
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• List of Figures
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• Part I Social power and urban space
• Part II Confronting segregation
• Index