Spatial Inequality around London and other UK Cities - Essay Example

?Spatial Inequality around London and other UK Cities Background The urban spatial segregation came to be recognised as a social and economic topic of importance after the Second World War. Vast research has been accomplished on singular cities or individual neighbourhood besides starting a trend of cross-city quantitative appraisal of area based inequality and its impact on policy decisions. Debate has been initiated in the context of European cities over the widespread deprivation and poverty related aspects of spatial inequality (McIntosh, 2002, p. 25). Introduction The UK is a welfare state and has been quite active in ameliorating expanding social inequalities that are attached with spatial segregation. This background on spatial segregation has given rise to the basic inquiry over the extent of spatial inequality in London and other cities of the UK. Spatial inequality is generally gauged by social inequality (as appraised via socio-economic parameters the like of un/employment or standard of education) or on race or ethnicity (as appraised by parameters of race or ethnic minority) (McIntosh, 2002). Data Deficiency Problem of insufficient quantitative data has been dominant across all European cities. That’s why EUROSTAT and the European Union has initiated research programmes, the like of BETWIXT project on selected cities including London. On social and employment scales, the European Community Household Panel Survey, the unitary Labour Force Survey and some new programmes have been initiated with a focus on comparative proof, policies and indicators and the Urban Audit with an increased area focus on standard of life data, which includes data on city level as well. Yet these efforts are handicapped by the absence of a single data source to predict outcomes on sub-city spatial segregation. Betwixt research project, in this context, is a comprehensive initiative to analyse empirically the situation in various cities in explorative, methodological and conclusive terms (McIntosh, 2002). There is a connection between spatial inequality and government fiscal policy. Unfortunately, there is lack of research and literature on the effects of fiscal policy on spatial equality. According to Kim, “the literature does not provide a guide on defining a list of specific policy recommendations for reducing ‘excessive’ spatial inequality or increasing ‘beneficial’ spatial inequality” (2008, p.35). In this regard, both statistical and theoretical perspectives hold value. What is Spatial Inequality? Spatial inequality can be defined by pointing out the gap in living standard because of lacunas in social and economic causes over a territory that can be quite large or small in size. In a country, spatial segregation can exist to start from state, province, district, and city and at neighbourhood level. At neighbourhood level, spatial inequality cannot be addressed by the central government to help implement positive policies because neighbourhood is quite low administrative level (Faguet and Shami, 2008). Fiscal policy can play a positive role in fighting the causes of inequality or reducing its effects or the possibility is that policy can aggravate the spatial inequality. According to Cheshire (2007), there is a decisive causation relationship between poverty and place. Comparing the indicators of deprivation among residents with affluent neighbourhoods is important but we can not measure how it affects the opportunities in peoples’ lives, as there is no way to keep an eye on them (p. 18). Motivations and desires as well as luck play a role in deciding the place of living. Neighbourhood choice depends on many other factors, as pointed out by Goering et al. (2003). “Since people typically select their neighbourhoods to match their needs and resources, researchers restricted to cross-sectional, non-experimental evidence must try to separate the impact of personal factors affecting choice of neighbourhood from effects of neighbourhood.” (Goering et al., 2003, p. 4). Personal factors impacting neighbourhood selection need to be separated through dedicated research as policy recommendations are based on the evidence derived from quality research. Britain has focused more on area-based policies, stressing on anti-poverty policies more than before after the coming into power of the New Labour Government in 1997. The government is highly motivated to remove child poverty and social excommunication. Cities in the north of England are found to be more prone to neighbourhood disparities in unemployment, which is relevant with the observed trend within cities, indicating income inequalities. In other words high overall unemployment was found to be linked to highest inter-neighbourhood differences. This difference of degrees in employment among different neighbourhoods within the boundary of a city can be detrimental on the social unity of a city (Social Harmony, 2009). Discussion of Evidence Working on its area-based social policies, the New Labour started zeroing-in on ‘worst estates’. It ran a number of thematic short-time area-based programmes, stressing on employment, health, crime and education. A department was attached with these high-end Action Zones; there was no room for local flexibility. Confusion prevailed because of variance in resource allocation, designated preferred area and monitoring system, which affected the coordination at local scale. A new programme was launched by the government, called New Deal for Communities; it was a multi-attribute approach. The 39 neighbourhoods were selected with a budget of 70-80m Euros for a 10-year period to resolve issues such as unemployment, crime, low skills, poor health, poor housing and the environment. The major theme was working together with the local community, local administration and other public and private organisations. The purpose was to bring together communities by initiating the regeneration process to promote local ownership, leadership and sustainability. This communitarian method of working together was criticized for taking a liberal approach towards social issues although relations between various poor communities and their leaders were not cool enough, as they had shared responsibilities. The ethnic minority community in particular felt the heat, as it underwent greater hardships on the count of unemployment as the rate of unemployment was two and a half times increased relatively to whites. Official evidence also backed these limitations (Lupton and Turok, 2004). Yet another government initiative, the National Strategy for Neighbourhood Renewal, while acknowledging the drawbacks of extra, short-time schemes, took a more streamlined approach. The neighbourhood was considered as a leading unit of policy implementation rather than an addition. The current leading policies and spatial initiatives were brought together under one umbrella. The new theme for neighbourhood renewal was that “within 10-20 years, no one should be seriously disadvantaged by where they live” (Social Exclusion Unit, 2001, p.8). Two time-specific aims were also set up, the first desiring absolute betterment and the second was about relative improvement: “to have lower worklessness; less crime; better health; better skills; and better housing and physical environment in all the poorest neighbourhoods; and to narrow the gap on these measures between the most deprived neighbourhoods and the rest of the country” (p.25), (as cited by Lupton and Turok, 2004). A Neighbourhood Renewal Unit was established to co-ordinate functions, with matching units at regional and local scale to link up on-going strategies and ‘bend’ leading public services in health, education, housing etc focusing them at the areas of greatest demand (Lupton and Turok, 2004). Another major initiative taken by BETWIXT, reports on levels of London’s neighbourhoods, Islington, Hollow and Lower Holloway, Islington was given the minimum attention out of the three neighbourhoods. The rate of unemployment was 6% while in the neighbourhood it was 12%, while considering only the adult population between the age of 25 to 54 years in 1999 (Fahey, T. ed, 2000). The size of the neighbourhood units was case-specific; there was huge variation in the size of units and sub-units. The inner centre of the London neighbourhood (Lower Holloway) is same in size, with nearly 6,000 residents, though Holloway overall, with near to 9,000 people, is not large proportionally (McIntosh, 2002). The impact of city -wide segregation BETWIXT study on London was aimed at measuring the city-scale distinctions in the designs of area segregation and social inequality. Outcomes proved that there was no uniform pattern of segregation and inequality, depending on various notions and scales of neighbourhood in question. The major difference cropped up in comparing the ‘services neighbourhood’ (which included local provisions and the built surroundings) with the ‘imagined neighbourhood’ dwelling on the ‘reputation’ criteria, stating quite opposing designs on objective conditions, provisions and the services emerged; they indicated no relevance with the varied reputation criteria attached to the ‘imagined neighbourhood’. In other words, there was no direct connection between reputation of an area and state of amenities. Not all stigmatised areas were ‘bad’ although some of them were in poor upkeep conditions. In the absence of any correlation between poverty and stigma, it indicated that both were independent variables in the hierarchy of urban neighbourhood (McIntosh, 2002). The ‘services’ neighbourhood The information on London’s neighbourhoods including empirical data, local neighbourhood reports and visits by BETWIXT researchers made it clear that the neighbourhoods were hugely different in the quality of living standards, provisions and social services they provided to people and these variations were widely similar to the designs of spatial segregation and social inequality noticed at city level (McIntosh, 2002). Holloway (London) Holloway was located on the centre of the parameters of social exclusion while Lower Holloway was the less deprived segment of that area, hence known as ‘precarious’ in stead of known as ‘deprived’. On most parameters, Holloway was quite miserable comparatively to London, with double the rate of unemployment, 50% more adults getting Income Support, about double the proportion in the bottom two social classes. On some parameters the divide was even wider, for instance the proportion of social renters was 73% in Holloway relatively to 29% across London –high by two and a half times and the lone parents were 54% in Holloway compared to 25% in London, which was more than double. These two things are linked: this is an area where the local council has high density of social housing, and the size fits a lone parent with a small child. Abnormal in the other aspect was the proportion of people of ethnic minority background: a little lower in Holloway in comparison to London overall. This is perhaps because of long-time settling of Irish people in Holloway, one of the three highest such areas in London. Thus a little greater white majority in t he area does not mean a greater English population (McIntosh, 2002). Causes of Neighbourhood Problems The source of problems remains between neighbourhood features and increased demand for housing and workforce. As people left unwanted neighbourhoods, other least advantaged people came to live there. This connection between the least advantaged places and people gave rise to ‘acquired characteristics’ such as vacant houses, increased rate of crime and weak social structure. It resulted in affecting the popularity of the area and the population mix. Such cases were also seen when coming together of all stakeholders, including the people, the police, housing departments and investment in housing brought back the notorious neighbourhoods on the path of recognition (Lupton and Turok, 2004). Thus, drivers of poor neighbourhoods were beyond the vicinity; various collective factors played their role in various places. There seem to be three causal processes. First, the economic differences are cropping up because of change in the job structure, shifting from industry-oriented to services sector, which has distinct spatial connotations. Job loss from the industry is not sufficiently getting compensated through the services sector. Further, old industrial areas are no more spatially relevant for services sector growth. Job opportunities are lesser in North and Midlands in comparison to London (Lupton and Turok, 2004). Another process having causal impact is redistribution of population shift towards South East. The country’s total population growth in the 1990s increased 2.7% but population growth in London, the South East or East of England was 75%. In the mean time, the population distribution trend is progressing. Smaller urban and rural areas are becoming densely populated while cities are shrinking. Other than London, all other cities are losing population except Leeds, as is evident from 7% population increase in London in the 1990s. It is causing housing pressure on London. Peoples’ priorities for housing have changed towards the trend of owning a house and leveraging from low interest rates on housing where population growth is insignificant (Lupton and Turok, 2004). Third, the ethnic populations have been high on growth in relation to whites, which constituted 91% in 2001. The ethnic populations have been populating large urban areas or small industrial towns, initiating a cyclical process of making urban areas diversely populated by them as well as increasing their strength in ‘majority minority’ areas (Lupton and Power, Forthcoming)). Among all ethnic communities, only Pakistani and Bangladeshi are at the receiving ends of residing in the most segregated areas (Lupton and Turok, 2004). Challenges for Policy Makers Challenges include restructuring policy parameters and role on the basis of area. Focus on neighbourhoods need to be under special surveillance of the government. Separate short-term attempts need to be made with a stress on employment, education, crime and health but without adhering to a rigid format. There is need to streamline the funding, priority regions and monitoring systems so that at local scale there is no confusion and lack of cooperation among various departments. Such government programmes as ‘New Deal for Communities’ including 39 neighbourhoods for a period of 10 years and a budget of 70-80m Euros working on the objective of partnering of all stakeholders to achieve set communities’ regeneration targets shows the intense faith in the notion of self-help and social capital by applying a communitarian perspective. Such a soft approach ignores the tension among various ethnic communities and among their leaders because of new duties given to them at a time when unemployment among ethnic groups is two and a half times higher than whites. Such criticism over implementation of government long term plans has the support of evidence revealed from government monitoring also (Neighbourhood Renewal Unit, 2003), (as cited by Lupton and Turok, 2004). The policy level impact on anti-poverty has been positive, as the rate of employment has increased to 74.9% and level of unemployment has scaled down. Inequality has decreased except the top 10% of the income distribution. The government has also succeeded in cutting down on child poverty. The government is following two targets; the floor targets to gain total improvement in the poorest areas and ‘convergence targets’ to cut the bridge between the poorest and others (Lupton and Turok, 2004). Certain targets such as social housing are within the reach, as demand for housing has decreased from 2.3 million to 1.6 million till 2000-01. As a lot of social housing and non-decent homes are in disadvantage areas, policy impacts on better housing conditions would be felt more. Actually, the government has been successful in all major initiatives taken in the specific sectors such as health, crime and education. Impact of policy efforts in some areas remains negative only because of latest immigration of unskilled workforce, facing partial treatment from employers such as noticed in Birmingham. Investors can play a positive role to support the government targets by investing in the development of such urban land, buildings and infrastructure that has been lying vacant so that area gets a facelift for better and optimum usage. References: Cheshire, P., 2007. Segregated neighbourhoods and mixed communities: a critical analysis. Joseph Rowntree Foundation. Available from: http://www.jrf.org.uk/sites/files/jrf/2066-segregation-mixed-communities.pdf [Accessed 1February 2012]. Faguet, Jean-Paul and Shami, Mahvish., 2010. Fiscal policy and spatial inequality in Latin America and beyond. LSE Research Online. Available from: http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/27162/1/Fiscal_policy_spatial_inequality_wp_(LSERO).pdf [Accessed 1February 2012]. Fahey, T. (ed.) 2000. Social profile of neighbourhoods in seven European cities. Betwixt project Stage B Report. Dublin, Economic and Social Research Institute. [Accessed 1February 2012]. Goering, J., Fiens, J.D. and Richardson, T.M., 2003. What have we learned about housing mobility and poverty de-concentration’, in J. Goering and J.D. Feins (eds) Choosing a Better Life: Evaluating the Moving to Opportunity Experiment. Washington, DC: The Urban Institute Press. Kim, Sukkoo., 2008. Spatial inequality and economic development: theories, facts and policies. Working Paper No. 16. World Bank, Commission on Growth and Development. Available from: http://www.growthcommission.org/storage/cgdev/documents/gcwp016web.pdf [Accessed 1February 2012]. Lupton, Ruth and Turok, Ivan., 2008. Anti-poverty policies in Britain: area-based and people-based approaches. In Walther, U-J. and Mensch, K. ed Armut und Ausgrenzung in der ‘Sozialen Stadt’, Darmstadt: Schader-Stiftung. Available from: http://www.beatsonappeal.net/media/media_72848_en.pdf [Accessed 1February 2012]. McIntosh, Susan., 2002. Between integration and exclusion: a comparative study in local dynamics of precarity and resistance to exclusion in urban contexts, final report. BETWIXT, Available from: http://cordis.europa.eu/documents/documentlibrary/70595561EN6.pdf [Accessed 1February 2012]. Social Harmony, Part II, 2009.State of the World Cities 2008-09. Available from: http://www.unhabitat.org.jo/en/inp/Upload/105655_part%20two%201-2.pdf [Accessed 1February 2012]. Read More