Papers by bahar sakizlioglu
Tijdschrift voor Economische en Sociale Geografie
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In this paper, we investigate the ethnic politics of commercial gentrification. We discuss how et... more In this paper, we investigate the ethnic politics of commercial gentrification. We discuss how ethnicity is conceived of, managed by, and integrated into urban policy; and how the changing ethnic composition of the neighborhood is perceived and lived by entrepreneurs with different ethnic and class backgrounds. We employ the notion of "mixed embeddedness," coined by Kloosterman et al., to understand the changes gentrification brings about for ethnic minority entrepreneurs and to explain their responses to these changes. Using the case study of a gentrifying street in Amsterdam, namely, Javastraat in Indische Buurt, we draw on an analysis of ethnic packaging at the policy level as well as in depth interviews with ethnically Dutch and ethnic minority entrepreneurs. Our findings shed light on how ethnic minorities survive and manage commercial gentrification on their doorsteps as well as the complexity of social mixedness in gentrifying neighborhoods.
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Book Chapters by bahar sakizlioglu
Gentrification alters the ways places are gendered and by doing so it reflects and affects the wa... more Gentrification alters the ways places are gendered and by doing so it reflects and affects the ways gender is constructed and experienced. The ways places are gendered as well as changes in gender notions may also affect the occurrence of gentrification. The concept of gentrification refers to a changing class composition – for instance, Hackworth (2002, p.815) defines gentrification as ‘the transformation of space for more affluent users’. Yet, gentrification is also a product of and invariably involves changes in gender relations and the production of gender inequalities. Despite the expanding literature on gentrification, our knowledge on its relation to gender constitution is limited.
The ways gender has been conceptualized and linked with gentrification have transformed from early 1980s up until today.Thanks to some crucial feminist interventions in the literature (see Rose (1984), Bondi(1991, 1999), Bondi and Rose (2003)), the research focus shifted from the role of women in gentrification processes to understanding gentrification as gender constitution, thus from categorical understanding of gender to conceptualizing gender as a set of social relations that are fundamentally structured by power relations in the society. In this chapter, I present a critical review of the existing literature pinpointing the gaps in our knowledge regarding the link between gentrification and gender. I call for a comparative and intersectional approach to investigate gendered geographies of gentrification. I conclude by underlining the need for a feminist engagement with knowledge production about gentrification as well as for feminist praxis to contest gendered inequalities and dispossessions involved in gendered geographies of gentrification.
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Books by bahar sakizlioglu
"In many cities, public authorities engage in redevelopment or renewal of disadvantaged neighborh... more "In many cities, public authorities engage in redevelopment or renewal of disadvantaged neighborhoods. While the aim is social, physical and economic upgrading of these neighborhoods, the result is often displacement of local residents. Despite the growing literature on displacement, we know little about how residents experience the process of displacement. This research studies residents’ displacement experiences through the analytical lens of accumulation by dispossession. It has three main aims: 1) to explain the macro dynamics of displacement; 2) to explain and compare how accumulation by dispossession works in different contexts of urban renewal; 3) to add a comparative dimension to the study of displacement through an intra- and inter-city comparison of residents’ displacement experiences on the basis of evidence from the two radically different cases of Amsterdam and Istanbul. The data is collected using qualitative methods: in-depth interviews, participant observation and document analysis. This study finds that the rationale of urban renewal is similar in Amsterdam and Istanbul: to re-differentiate the housing stock and reallocate urban space in such a way that gentrification is promoted. While the re-differentiation works through the privatization of social housing and the promotion of homeownership in Amsterdam, in Istanbul it works through the formalization of informal housing arrangements and expropriation of private property. The ways displacement is realized in these cities differs in important ways. Displacement in Amsterdam can be characterized as routinized exclusionary displacement, whereas displacement in Istanbul is direct and discretionary.
Residents’ displacement experiences are compared based on three dimensions: 1) experiences of the policy and living under the threat of displacement; 2) impacts of the displacement; 3) collective and household strategies. As for the conclusions regarding these dimensions, firstly, the ways residents lived under the threat of displacement were quite similar in both cities: a spiral of decline, uncertainty, anxious waiting, pressures of authorities and landlords signified the processes. While regular renters in Amsterdam were mostly satisfied with compensations, guidance they received, the property owners and renters in Istanbul were largely dissatisfied about these issues. Experiences of participation differed drastically. While in Amsterdam, the residents were invited to participate in the process, residents in Tarlabasi contested the authorities to participate in the decision making.
Secondly, the impacts of displacement are, in general, lighter in Dutch context due to the well established rights of residents with regular social housing rent contracts. In contrast to this, lower-class residents in Istanbul had to bear high economic and social costs (e.g. higher rents, rupture in social networks). In both cities, existing social boundaries were redefined during the displacement processes based on ethnicity, tenure and class property ownership. Thirdly, the most precarious resident groups, namely the temporary renters in Amsterdam and renters and squatters in Istanbul, used strategies at the household level to cope with displacement. While in Amsterdam residents didn’t use any collective strategy, property owners initiated the resistance in Tarlabasi, which could not prevent displacement yet could get some compensation for some."
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Blog Posts by bahar sakizlioglu
In many cities, public authorities engage in redevelopment or renewal of disadvantaged ... more In many cities, public authorities engage in redevelopment or renewal of disadvantaged neighbourhoods. While the aim is social, physical and economic upgrading of these neighbourhoods, the result is often displacement of local residents. Despite the growing literature on displacement, we know little about how residents experience the process of displacement. This research studies residents’ displacement experiences through the analytical lens of accumulation by dispossession. This post looks at the challenges and rewards that come with comparative methods.
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Book Reviews by bahar sakizlioglu
Gentrification literature bears the imprints of crucial academic debates in social theory such as... more Gentrification literature bears the imprints of crucial academic debates in social theory such as the relation of agency to structure, of production to consumption and of culture to capital and as Ward and Macleod (2002) underlines, it has served as a ‘theoretical battleground’ for urban researchers. With her theoretically and empirically rich study of gentrification based on a case study from Glasgow, Kirsteen Paton delicately synthesizes these debates employing hegemony as a theoretical perspective. Her study investigates how working class residents experience the process of gentrification to reclaim the legacy of class in gentrification and urban literature. In this review, I will present my comments of Paton's book organized around three issues, namely 1) bridging the macro and micro theory; 2) refining the categorization of displacement; and 3) place-based analysis of class.
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Papers by bahar sakizlioglu
Book Chapters by bahar sakizlioglu
The ways gender has been conceptualized and linked with gentrification have transformed from early 1980s up until today.Thanks to some crucial feminist interventions in the literature (see Rose (1984), Bondi(1991, 1999), Bondi and Rose (2003)), the research focus shifted from the role of women in gentrification processes to understanding gentrification as gender constitution, thus from categorical understanding of gender to conceptualizing gender as a set of social relations that are fundamentally structured by power relations in the society. In this chapter, I present a critical review of the existing literature pinpointing the gaps in our knowledge regarding the link between gentrification and gender. I call for a comparative and intersectional approach to investigate gendered geographies of gentrification. I conclude by underlining the need for a feminist engagement with knowledge production about gentrification as well as for feminist praxis to contest gendered inequalities and dispossessions involved in gendered geographies of gentrification.
Books by bahar sakizlioglu
Residents’ displacement experiences are compared based on three dimensions: 1) experiences of the policy and living under the threat of displacement; 2) impacts of the displacement; 3) collective and household strategies. As for the conclusions regarding these dimensions, firstly, the ways residents lived under the threat of displacement were quite similar in both cities: a spiral of decline, uncertainty, anxious waiting, pressures of authorities and landlords signified the processes. While regular renters in Amsterdam were mostly satisfied with compensations, guidance they received, the property owners and renters in Istanbul were largely dissatisfied about these issues. Experiences of participation differed drastically. While in Amsterdam, the residents were invited to participate in the process, residents in Tarlabasi contested the authorities to participate in the decision making.
Secondly, the impacts of displacement are, in general, lighter in Dutch context due to the well established rights of residents with regular social housing rent contracts. In contrast to this, lower-class residents in Istanbul had to bear high economic and social costs (e.g. higher rents, rupture in social networks). In both cities, existing social boundaries were redefined during the displacement processes based on ethnicity, tenure and class property ownership. Thirdly, the most precarious resident groups, namely the temporary renters in Amsterdam and renters and squatters in Istanbul, used strategies at the household level to cope with displacement. While in Amsterdam residents didn’t use any collective strategy, property owners initiated the resistance in Tarlabasi, which could not prevent displacement yet could get some compensation for some."
Blog Posts by bahar sakizlioglu
Book Reviews by bahar sakizlioglu
The ways gender has been conceptualized and linked with gentrification have transformed from early 1980s up until today.Thanks to some crucial feminist interventions in the literature (see Rose (1984), Bondi(1991, 1999), Bondi and Rose (2003)), the research focus shifted from the role of women in gentrification processes to understanding gentrification as gender constitution, thus from categorical understanding of gender to conceptualizing gender as a set of social relations that are fundamentally structured by power relations in the society. In this chapter, I present a critical review of the existing literature pinpointing the gaps in our knowledge regarding the link between gentrification and gender. I call for a comparative and intersectional approach to investigate gendered geographies of gentrification. I conclude by underlining the need for a feminist engagement with knowledge production about gentrification as well as for feminist praxis to contest gendered inequalities and dispossessions involved in gendered geographies of gentrification.
Residents’ displacement experiences are compared based on three dimensions: 1) experiences of the policy and living under the threat of displacement; 2) impacts of the displacement; 3) collective and household strategies. As for the conclusions regarding these dimensions, firstly, the ways residents lived under the threat of displacement were quite similar in both cities: a spiral of decline, uncertainty, anxious waiting, pressures of authorities and landlords signified the processes. While regular renters in Amsterdam were mostly satisfied with compensations, guidance they received, the property owners and renters in Istanbul were largely dissatisfied about these issues. Experiences of participation differed drastically. While in Amsterdam, the residents were invited to participate in the process, residents in Tarlabasi contested the authorities to participate in the decision making.
Secondly, the impacts of displacement are, in general, lighter in Dutch context due to the well established rights of residents with regular social housing rent contracts. In contrast to this, lower-class residents in Istanbul had to bear high economic and social costs (e.g. higher rents, rupture in social networks). In both cities, existing social boundaries were redefined during the displacement processes based on ethnicity, tenure and class property ownership. Thirdly, the most precarious resident groups, namely the temporary renters in Amsterdam and renters and squatters in Istanbul, used strategies at the household level to cope with displacement. While in Amsterdam residents didn’t use any collective strategy, property owners initiated the resistance in Tarlabasi, which could not prevent displacement yet could get some compensation for some."