wacquant urban poverty

8/10/2019 Wacquant Urban Poverty

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From vision to division

Contemporary City: social changePresentation on Wacquants paper:

Red Belt, Black Belt: Racial Division, ClassInequality, and the State in the FrenchUrban Periphery and the American Ghetto

Jelena Ljubojevic | Silvia SpolaorProf. Costanzo Ranci


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1) American spatial territorial division according to ethno ratial characteristics as aparadigm

2) European poverty americanized?

3) Urban exclusion in the cases of USA black belt and France red belt

4) The 4 themes of similarities and disparities

! Territorial stigma

!

Delinquency, street violence and the shrinking of the public space

! Institutional isolation versus organizational desertification

! Social vision and division in ghetto andbanlieue

5) Urban exclusion in the cases of Italian cities Naples and Milan

6) Conclusion

Index


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+ 1) American spatial territorial division accordingto ethno ratial characteristics as a paradigm

_In order to understand the degradation of urban conditions and relations,European scholars have turned towards the United States for analytical

assistance. Wacquant argues how theories from American scholars have

created a starting point for European studies of urban ethno racial enclaves.

_American conceptual idiom of race relations has purchased on the urban

realities of Europe, leaving aside the question of weather conventionalAmerican categories pack any analytical power on their own behalf to start

with.

Comparison of contemporary forms of urban inequality and ethno-racial/ class

exclusion which:

! does not presuppose that the analytical tools used on one continent could

be applied on the other;

! attends to the meanings and lived experiences of social immobility and

marginality;

! strives firmly to embed individual strategies and collective trajectories

into the local social structure as well as within the broader


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+2) European poverty americanized?

Two trends that reshaped the western European cities over the past twodecades:

!

Rise of urban inequalities and new forms of socio-economic marginality

(special ethnic component)

! Spread of ethno-racial and xenophobic ideologies and tensions due to

unemployment

Expression to refer to the new spaces

! the new poverty

!

immigrant ghettos

! neighborhood exile

! branded space


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+3) Urban exclusion in the cases of the Americanghetto and the French banlieue

!

Analysis of the social and mental structures of urban exclusion in the Americanblack belt [dark ghetto - racial enclaves]

!

and the French red belt [traditional mode of organization of French workers

city close integration of work, home and public life]

!

Predominance of youths, manual workers or deskilled service personnel, largeconcentration of minorities, high levels of unemployment cased by de-

industrialization and labor market changes

!

Exclusion operates on the basis of:


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+[RED] France Le Quatre Mille

[BLACK] USA South side ghetto of Chicago

RED BELT

class and mitigated by the state

heterogeneous

BLACK BELT

color reinforced by class and state

homogeneous


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+4) The 4 themes of similarities and

disparities

Social organization and cognitive structures contrasting four dimensions of

daily life

a. Territorial Stigma

According to the research data was held through interviews of the inhabitants

of the neighborhoods they resulted strong perception of powerful stigmas.

RED BELT

its like there is a plague here

Negative public image: delinquency, immigration

and insecurity/ confined to a branded spacetrap/ arab poverty and ethnicizationof

frances urban space.

!

The inhabitants do not recognize as part of a

whole micro-locales

! Change buildings means to change lives

!

Awareness of being exiles


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people really look down on you because of where you come from

! national symbol of urban pathology;

! Incontrovertible proof of moral dissolution, cultural depravity and behavioral

deficiencies of its inhabitants;

! Living in the black belts carries an automatic presumption of social unworthiness

and moral inferiority;

!

The only route for improvement is to move out.

Main effect of stigma: it is to stimulate practices of internal social

differentiation and distancing that work to decrease interpersonal trust

and undercut local social solidarity.

BLACK BELT


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b. Delinquency, street violence and the shrinking of the public space

feeling of insecurity

!

Youth delinquency and the feeling of

insecurity ofLe Quatre Mille

! Outsiders: bad neighborhood to be

avoided

! Pretty safe neighborhood to walk,

commuters come and cross to take

the metro, people use the park for

picnics and walking dogs

! Most common crime: motorcycle

thefts, petty robberies and larceny,

drugs and alcoholism, not strongflow of drugs

actual physical danger

USA: national symbol of urbanpathology

! Incontrovertible proof of moraldissolution, cultural depravity andbehavioral deficiencies of itsinhabitants

! Living in the black belts carries an

automatic presumption of socialunworthiness and moral inferiority

! The only route for improvement is tomove out

RED BELT BLACK BELT


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the paradox of organizational density andinstitutional isolation on the red belt

! Ramified state intervention: over-

penetration of public organizations

! schools, health centers, social services,

leisure centers

! lack of efficiency and coordination

between the myriad public and semi-

public organizations

! dependency and dissatisfaction as a

vicious cycle

! number of state agencies contribute to

further stigmatizing, increasing

sentiment of isolation and discontent

organizational desertification and thedebilitation of the public sector in the

ghetto

!

retrenchment of the public sector andrestructuring of central-city markets

! private investments attracting whiteworkers on the north and creating

abandoned ghettos on the west and

south

! abandoned and bad quality buildings,

no healthcare facilities

! the regular wage-labor economy has

been replaced by the irregular and

often illegal street economy

RED BELT BLACK BELT

c. Institutional isolation versus organizational desertification

_Both black and red belt are perceived as organizationally lacking and the

residents of each deplore the dearth of key organizations needed to contribute

to the communitys functioning and well-being


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Jeunes des cits against the rest of theworld

!

youth vs. other social categories :

dominant antagonism

! youths are both the cause and the

victims on an incident

! nobody sees us, we dont exist.

! Tolerance even if buildings are

separated by ethnicity

American apartheid and dichotomousracial consciousness

!

race is inscribed everywhere in the

ghetto: objectivity of the space,

separate and inferior institutions

! racial categories have an immediacyand pervasiveness that make them

central cognitive tools

! once a nigger, always a nigger

RED BELT BLACK BELT

d.social vision and division in ghetto and banlieue

_in the banlieue, the highly heterogeneous universe in which racial or ethnic

categories have little social potency


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! Modernist suburb built in the North of

Naples, 1964, as a social housingproject

!

Huge apartments complexes, wide

boulevards, and a massive park where

built, but without commercial districts

or entertainment venues

5) Urban exclusion in the cases of Italian

cities

a. Naples: Scampia, the white belt

! Nation known for being controlled by the organized criminal groups, involved with

drug trafficking

!

Characterized by: Territorial stigma, delinquency, insecurity and abandoned open

spaces, previous public space was used for drug trading and consuming; illegal

activities.


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! Modernist, self-effcient

neighborhood, on the edge;

Built in 1953- biggest public

housing project in Italy

! Massive project, based

around underground

walkways, long concrete

balconies and a space-age

church

! First inhabitant immigrants

from Veneto, Sicily, abroad

b. Milan: Comasina, the yellow belt


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! Dark walkways places for criminalactivities, garbage, dump; lack of

meeting places for the residents; The

area was described as a dead zone,

isolated, lifeless.

! Communication with Milan and nextneighborhoods was slow and

infrequent; no post office; few shops; no

alternative;

! Limited integration with the city;

! Became the classic ghetto, empty byday -83.7% of residents were waged

employees 48.2% workers, 35.5%

commited, except for the old, the very

young, the unemployed and non-working women.

! Immigrants from Asia, mostly comingfrom China;

! Has ongoing projects for its

regeneration and improvment and an

active neighborhood association;

! There is still a negative conotationregarding the neighbourhoods history.

Comasina before Today Comasina

b. Milan: Comasina, the yellow belt


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+Conclusions

Analyzing deprived neighborhoods of Scampia and Comasina, there is aparallel flow of a neighbourhood growth and condition through years oftransformation, which depends on:

! The use of space by the residents

! Number of public spaces and activates provided by the urban plan

! Presence of cultural institutions or public institutions and businesses

! Connectivity with other areas surrounding it

Neighborhood plans must contain a timeline and a strategic plan onthe future flexiblility and transformation. These examples show how there isa thin line betweenVISION and DIVISION, turn out to be incapable ofhandling new inhabitants/migration and different ways of life in the futuretimes. There was no space for regenerationand no state involvement insolving problems at real-time, which resulted pilling up of problems.

wacquant urban poverty

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