Pub Date : 2025-11-17DOI: 10.1177/00420980251390306
Antonin Margier, Geoffrey DeVerteuil
In this article, we shed light on the growth and flexibility of the voluntary sector as it responds to the housing crisis in American cities. To do so, we adopt a perspective from the margins of the post-welfare city (using governmentality studies), focusing on obscure grassroots actors at the interface of the state, the voluntary sector and civil society. Based on fieldwork carried out in Portland, Oregon (USA), this article analyzes city code changes and incentives as government technologies, to shed light on how civil society and voluntary organizations operating at the margins are made responsible for providing resources and participating in the response to homelessness, while simultaneously having their practices subjected to control. We argue that, far from being excluded, some organizations at the margins are selected by the state for inclusion in the voluntary sector, while others remain at the margins as a way to delegitimize their own interventions and the way they provide services.
{"title":"Growth and flexibility at the margins? The voluntary sector and civil society in post-welfare Portland","authors":"Antonin Margier, Geoffrey DeVerteuil","doi":"10.1177/00420980251390306","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00420980251390306","url":null,"abstract":"In this article, we shed light on the growth and flexibility of the voluntary sector as it responds to the housing crisis in American cities. To do so, we adopt a perspective from the margins of the post-welfare city (using governmentality studies), focusing on obscure grassroots actors at the interface of the state, the voluntary sector and civil society. Based on fieldwork carried out in Portland, Oregon (USA), this article analyzes city code changes and incentives as government technologies, to shed light on how civil society and voluntary organizations operating at the margins are made responsible for providing resources and participating in the response to homelessness, while simultaneously having their practices subjected to control. We argue that, far from being excluded, some organizations at the margins are selected by the state for inclusion in the voluntary sector, while others remain at the margins as a way to delegitimize their own interventions and the way they provide services.","PeriodicalId":51350,"journal":{"name":"Urban Studies","volume":"174 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.7,"publicationDate":"2025-11-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145531596","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-11-14DOI: 10.1177/00420980251382327
Kristina Ulm, Oona Morrow, Evelyne de Leeuw, David Sanderson, Alec Thornton
Citizen-led initiatives, like urban gardening, are increasingly transforming urban public spaces. Such practices of DIY urbanism have prompted varied policy responses from local governments across the world. Public urban gardening is a form of citizen initiative that involves the small-scale appropriation of publicly accessible open space for gardening with or without the approval of the landowner, usually the local authority. Growing plants on public footpaths and in nature strips can range from unregulated guerilla gardening to publicly authorised community gardens. These novel forms of shared responsibility and stewardship of public space can challenge traditional forms of urban governance, which depend on a separation between public and private. At the same time, neoliberal forms of urban governance that have developed in the context of austerity have encouraged citizen empowerment and responsibility for the management of public space in cities, with varying outcomes. This article investigates the range of policy approaches to public urban gardening in Greater Sydney, Australia, a metropolitan area comprising 33 local governments. We employ Vedung’s typology of public policy instruments for the qualitative analysis of policy documents and identify five types of policy approaches within Greater Sydney. We find that trust-based policy instruments (being notified of an activity) are increasingly preferred by local government and enable a collaborative approach to the governance of public urban gardening. The case illustrates a diversity of public policy instruments, depending on the local context, for incorporating public urban gardening into policy and potentially contributing to a healthy and sustainable city.
{"title":"Urban gardening in public space: Policy approaches in Greater Sydney","authors":"Kristina Ulm, Oona Morrow, Evelyne de Leeuw, David Sanderson, Alec Thornton","doi":"10.1177/00420980251382327","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00420980251382327","url":null,"abstract":"Citizen-led initiatives, like urban gardening, are increasingly transforming urban public spaces. Such practices of DIY urbanism have prompted varied policy responses from local governments across the world. Public urban gardening is a form of citizen initiative that involves the small-scale appropriation of publicly accessible open space for gardening with or without the approval of the landowner, usually the local authority. Growing plants on public footpaths and in nature strips can range from unregulated guerilla gardening to publicly authorised community gardens. These novel forms of shared responsibility and stewardship of public space can challenge traditional forms of urban governance, which depend on a separation between public and private. At the same time, neoliberal forms of urban governance that have developed in the context of austerity have encouraged citizen empowerment and responsibility for the management of public space in cities, with varying outcomes. This article investigates the range of policy approaches to public urban gardening in Greater Sydney, Australia, a metropolitan area comprising 33 local governments. We employ Vedung’s typology of public policy instruments for the qualitative analysis of policy documents and identify five types of policy approaches within Greater Sydney. We find that trust-based policy instruments (being notified of an activity) are increasingly preferred by local government and enable a collaborative approach to the governance of public urban gardening. The case illustrates a diversity of public policy instruments, depending on the local context, for incorporating public urban gardening into policy and potentially contributing to a healthy and sustainable city.","PeriodicalId":51350,"journal":{"name":"Urban Studies","volume":"94 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.7,"publicationDate":"2025-11-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145515585","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-11-14DOI: 10.1177/00420980251387814
Claire W. Herbert, Lesley Jo Weaver, Dylan J. Podrabsky, Emma Singleton
Research has long identified street-level bureaucrats (SLBs)—often police—as key intermediaries shaping the governance of homelessness. Rising rates of unsheltered homelessness in the US implicate new public and private actors in these processes. This article broadens the focus of existing research using 42 interviews with SLBs in a mid-size US city to analyze how they interpret tent and vehicle encampments, and how they make decisions about displacement. These SLBs are from varied government and nonprofit agencies including parks, waste management, and public works, and generally lack training and official protocol to guide their interactions with the unhoused residents they regularly encounter in their work. We identify a common heuristic these SLBs use, interpreting encampments as posing urgent threats to three public priorities: safety, sanitation, and the environment. These ostensible threats and the correlated urgency of remediation guide their decision-making regarding encampment displacement. This heuristic allows SLBs to align with local progressive values, while obfuscating their role in penalizing people without housing and undermining efforts to resolve homelessness. These findings highlight another way in which SLBs’ interpretive actions perpetuate inequality, reproduce enforcement patterns across protective and punitive regulatory agencies, and shape priorities in the expanding field of urban homeless governance.
{"title":"When penalties are framed as protections: Street-level bureaucrats and the expansion of homeless governance in the US","authors":"Claire W. Herbert, Lesley Jo Weaver, Dylan J. Podrabsky, Emma Singleton","doi":"10.1177/00420980251387814","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00420980251387814","url":null,"abstract":"Research has long identified street-level bureaucrats (SLBs)—often police—as key intermediaries shaping the governance of homelessness. Rising rates of unsheltered homelessness in the US implicate new public and private actors in these processes. This article broadens the focus of existing research using 42 interviews with SLBs in a mid-size US city to analyze how they interpret tent and vehicle encampments, and how they make decisions about displacement. These SLBs are from varied government and nonprofit agencies including parks, waste management, and public works, and generally lack training and official protocol to guide their interactions with the unhoused residents they regularly encounter in their work. We identify a common heuristic these SLBs use, interpreting encampments as posing urgent threats to three public priorities: safety, sanitation, and the environment. These ostensible threats and the correlated urgency of remediation guide their decision-making regarding encampment displacement. This heuristic allows SLBs to align with local progressive values, while obfuscating their role in penalizing people without housing and undermining efforts to resolve homelessness. These findings highlight another way in which SLBs’ interpretive actions perpetuate inequality, reproduce enforcement patterns across protective and punitive regulatory agencies, and shape priorities in the expanding field of urban homeless governance.","PeriodicalId":51350,"journal":{"name":"Urban Studies","volume":"174 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.7,"publicationDate":"2025-11-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145515790","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-11-14DOI: 10.1177/00420980251377708
Shi Yin Chee
What does aging look like when childless older adults born between 1946 and 1964, commonly referred to as Baby Boomers, enter urban-based senior living facilities that are often shaped by age-friendly ideals but still built around familial involvement? Many find themselves challenging a system rooted in older norms that never anticipated these higher childlessness rates. This study explored the lived experiences of older adults with functional limitations who identify as childless, whether partnered or unpartnered, focusing on how they navigate daily life, maintain agency, and establish support systems in densely populated institutional settings. Using Moustakas’ transcendental phenomenology and the Modified Stevick–Colaizzi–Keen method, semi-structured interviews were conducted with 20 participants across six urban-based senior living facilities in Selangor and Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Four themes emerged: institutional blind spots that overlook childless older adults, the formation of chosen families, financial security without familial safeguards, and the balance between solitude and self-determination. Rather than descending into isolation, participants demonstrated proactive strategies to preserve autonomy. As one of the first generations aging in large numbers without children, these findings underscore how urban aging infrastructure, spatial policy assumptions, and care systems lag behind changing family structures. The findings highlight a need for targeted reforms, reminding facility administrators, policymakers, and care professionals to recognize diverse later-life paths and ensure that older adults without children remain visible, validated, and empowered within urban care systems.
{"title":"No child to call: Lived experiences of childless older adults from the Baby Boomer generation with functional limitations in urban senior living facilities","authors":"Shi Yin Chee","doi":"10.1177/00420980251377708","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00420980251377708","url":null,"abstract":"What does aging look like when childless older adults born between 1946 and 1964, commonly referred to as Baby Boomers, enter urban-based senior living facilities that are often shaped by age-friendly ideals but still built around familial involvement? Many find themselves challenging a system rooted in older norms that never anticipated these higher childlessness rates. This study explored the lived experiences of older adults with functional limitations who identify as childless, whether partnered or unpartnered, focusing on how they navigate daily life, maintain agency, and establish support systems in densely populated institutional settings. Using Moustakas’ transcendental phenomenology and the Modified Stevick–Colaizzi–Keen method, semi-structured interviews were conducted with 20 participants across six urban-based senior living facilities in Selangor and Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Four themes emerged: institutional blind spots that overlook childless older adults, the formation of chosen families, financial security without familial safeguards, and the balance between solitude and self-determination. Rather than descending into isolation, participants demonstrated proactive strategies to preserve autonomy. As one of the first generations aging in large numbers without children, these findings underscore how urban aging infrastructure, spatial policy assumptions, and care systems lag behind changing family structures. The findings highlight a need for targeted reforms, reminding facility administrators, policymakers, and care professionals to recognize diverse later-life paths and ensure that older adults without children remain visible, validated, and empowered within urban care systems.","PeriodicalId":51350,"journal":{"name":"Urban Studies","volume":"13 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.7,"publicationDate":"2025-11-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145515782","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-11-12DOI: 10.1177/00420980251379767
Josje Bouwmeester, Deniz Ay, Jean-David Gerber, Thomas Hartmann
One of the difficulties in implementing densification objectives is that planners often do not have sufficient coercive power to restrict property rights, which means that landowners can resist the implementation of land use plans. As a result, planning increasingly takes place on the project level, allowing planning authorities and developers to renegotiate the terms and conditions of densification. While project-level negotiations have been researched, these studies do not focus on individual landowners but rather on developers. This article examines how developers and public authorities manage the property rights of individual landowners to prevent delays or blockages in project implementation. Drawing on a comparative case study of Thun (Switzerland) and Utrecht (Netherlands), we show how project-based planning takes different forms depending on legal frameworks and planning norms. In Thun, strategies focus on consensus building and input legitimacy; in Utrecht, more coercive instruments such as expropriation are used and legitimized based on their output. The findings suggest that project-based planning tends to exclude individual landowners from negotiation, framing their objections as obstructions to be managed. While individual owners’ interests are often sidelined, the private economic interests of developers and large landowners often appeal to collective goals such as climate change mitigation or housing supply. This raises broader questions about which interests are recognized, or dismissed, in the construction of social sustainability in urban densification.
{"title":"Small plots, big stakes: Strategic responses to individual landowners’ property rights in densification projects","authors":"Josje Bouwmeester, Deniz Ay, Jean-David Gerber, Thomas Hartmann","doi":"10.1177/00420980251379767","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00420980251379767","url":null,"abstract":"One of the difficulties in implementing densification objectives is that planners often do not have sufficient coercive power to restrict property rights, which means that landowners can resist the implementation of land use plans. As a result, planning increasingly takes place on the project level, allowing planning authorities and developers to renegotiate the terms and conditions of densification. While project-level negotiations have been researched, these studies do not focus on individual landowners but rather on developers. This article examines how developers and public authorities manage the property rights of individual landowners to prevent delays or blockages in project implementation. Drawing on a comparative case study of Thun (Switzerland) and Utrecht (Netherlands), we show how project-based planning takes different forms depending on legal frameworks and planning norms. In Thun, strategies focus on consensus building and input legitimacy; in Utrecht, more coercive instruments such as expropriation are used and legitimized based on their output. The findings suggest that project-based planning tends to exclude individual landowners from negotiation, framing their objections as obstructions to be managed. While individual owners’ interests are often sidelined, the private economic interests of developers and large landowners often appeal to collective goals such as climate change mitigation or housing supply. This raises broader questions about which interests are recognized, or dismissed, in the construction of social sustainability in urban densification.","PeriodicalId":51350,"journal":{"name":"Urban Studies","volume":"47 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.7,"publicationDate":"2025-11-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145491844","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-11-12DOI: 10.1177/00420980251382753
Rory Coulter, Antoine Paccoud
Housing is central to the social dynamics of cities. However, many recent citywide analyses of social change have largely set aside housing to concentrate on shifts in income and occupational class structure. In this paper, we argue that examining the intersections of class with tenure provides a richer framework for making sense of patterns and processes of urban social change. Using data from the 2011 and 2021 Censuses, we examine (1) how the intersecting occupational class and housing tenure position of households in London has changed over the decade before (2) analysing the shifting locational and tenure positions of middle- and working-class households in the capital. The results show that ‘leasing space’ through the private rented sector is a key dynamic enabling the continued gentrification of Inner London boroughs. The apparent persistence of working-class London meanwhile masks disadvantageous changes in the residential position of working-class households, as declines in working-class homeownership and social housing have been offset by the growth of working-class private renting in the northern and western suburbs. These restructuring trends have major implications for social inequalities of wealth, residential security and access to opportunities.
{"title":"Leasing space through the private rented sector: The intersections of class and tenure change in London, 2011–2021","authors":"Rory Coulter, Antoine Paccoud","doi":"10.1177/00420980251382753","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00420980251382753","url":null,"abstract":"Housing is central to the social dynamics of cities. However, many recent citywide analyses of social change have largely set aside housing to concentrate on shifts in income and occupational class structure. In this paper, we argue that examining the intersections of class with tenure provides a richer framework for making sense of patterns and processes of urban social change. Using data from the 2011 and 2021 Censuses, we examine (1) how the intersecting occupational class and housing tenure position of households in London has changed over the decade before (2) analysing the shifting locational and tenure positions of middle- and working-class households in the capital. The results show that ‘leasing space’ through the private rented sector is a key dynamic enabling the continued gentrification of Inner London boroughs. The apparent persistence of working-class London meanwhile masks disadvantageous changes in the residential position of working-class households, as declines in working-class homeownership and social housing have been offset by the growth of working-class private renting in the northern and western suburbs. These restructuring trends have major implications for social inequalities of wealth, residential security and access to opportunities.","PeriodicalId":51350,"journal":{"name":"Urban Studies","volume":"14 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.7,"publicationDate":"2025-11-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145491812","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
While vertical densification offers numerous benefits, it can also lead to environmental harm, damage to cultural heritage, increased housing costs and exclusionary gentrification, posing significant challenges for urban governance. In Chile, new progressive local governments are working to regulate vertical densification. This study compares the development paths of two boroughs: Valparaíso and San Miguel. By utilising official property datasets, density maps and qualitative data analysis based on semi-structured interviews, the study explores how previous market-orientated, laissez-faire vertical densification policies are superseded by stricter regulations driven by progressive local politics, under the promise of alternative, less-dense densification. The cases illustrate, in the first instance, grassroots mobilisation and judicial challenges that restrict vertical growth; and in the second instance, restrictions on density regulations that do not affect floor area ratios. The study reveals the limited effectiveness of these approaches, as they lead to either a shortage of affordable and social housing or exclusionary gentrification, despite the central government’s funding of social housing estates aimed at preventing this. Therefore, more comprehensive densification policies are essential. This case study highlights the fragile governance of vertical densification in Chile’s ‘progressive municipalism’, its centrality in the political trajectories of the boroughs and the challenges in reconciling local community opposition with the need for housing welfare under the (still neoliberal) market rule.
{"title":"The politics of vertical densification in Chile: Bridging planning, contestation and housing welfare under progressive municipalism","authors":"Ernesto López-Morales, Rodrigo Caimanque, Nicolás Herrera, Odette Garrido","doi":"10.1177/00420980251377714","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00420980251377714","url":null,"abstract":"While vertical densification offers numerous benefits, it can also lead to environmental harm, damage to cultural heritage, increased housing costs and exclusionary gentrification, posing significant challenges for urban governance. In Chile, new progressive local governments are working to regulate vertical densification. This study compares the development paths of two boroughs: Valparaíso and San Miguel. By utilising official property datasets, density maps and qualitative data analysis based on semi-structured interviews, the study explores how previous market-orientated, laissez-faire vertical densification policies are superseded by stricter regulations driven by progressive local politics, under the promise of alternative, less-dense densification. The cases illustrate, in the first instance, grassroots mobilisation and judicial challenges that restrict vertical growth; and in the second instance, restrictions on density regulations that do not affect floor area ratios. The study reveals the limited effectiveness of these approaches, as they lead to either a shortage of affordable and social housing or exclusionary gentrification, despite the central government’s funding of social housing estates aimed at preventing this. Therefore, more comprehensive densification policies are essential. This case study highlights the fragile governance of vertical densification in Chile’s ‘progressive municipalism’, its centrality in the political trajectories of the boroughs and the challenges in reconciling local community opposition with the need for housing welfare under the (still neoliberal) market rule.","PeriodicalId":51350,"journal":{"name":"Urban Studies","volume":"49 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.7,"publicationDate":"2025-11-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145485836","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-11-10DOI: 10.1177/00420980251385996
Nufar Avni
This article explores the growing phenomenon of liberal cities operating within increasingly autocratizing national regimes. While tensions between cities and states are not new, recent developments in countries such as Hungary, Poland, Turkey, Israel, and the USA highlight a distinct and urgent dynamic: urban resistance in the face of democratic backsliding and autocratization. Drawing on emerging scholarship from urban studies, political science, and geography, the article synthesizes three burgeoning strands of literature: (1) city-level activism contesting autocratizing national policies, (2) the transnational engagement of cities through city diplomacy and alliances, and (3) state-led constraints on urban autonomy. These studies reveal unique patterns and settings shaped by the global autocratic turn, which go beyond more established frictions between cities and states. Through this scholarship, the article examines how municipalities governed by progressive actors respond to central state pressures, leveraging legal, financial, symbolic, and diplomatic tools to assert autonomy and uphold liberal-democratic values. Case studies such as Istanbul, Budapest, and the Pact of Free Cities illustrate how cities act as democratic enclaves, navigating structural constraints to mobilize resistance. By identifying research gaps and proposing new avenues for investigation, this article advances a research agenda that re-centers cities as critical actors in contemporary struggles for democracy.
{"title":"Liberal cities in autocratizing states: Scholarly pathways and a research agenda","authors":"Nufar Avni","doi":"10.1177/00420980251385996","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00420980251385996","url":null,"abstract":"This article explores the growing phenomenon of liberal cities operating within increasingly autocratizing national regimes. While tensions between cities and states are not new, recent developments in countries such as Hungary, Poland, Turkey, Israel, and the USA highlight a distinct and urgent dynamic: urban resistance in the face of democratic backsliding and autocratization. Drawing on emerging scholarship from urban studies, political science, and geography, the article synthesizes three burgeoning strands of literature: (1) city-level activism contesting autocratizing national policies, (2) the transnational engagement of cities through city diplomacy and alliances, and (3) state-led constraints on urban autonomy. These studies reveal unique patterns and settings shaped by the global autocratic turn, which go beyond more established frictions between cities and states. Through this scholarship, the article examines how municipalities governed by progressive actors respond to central state pressures, leveraging legal, financial, symbolic, and diplomatic tools to assert autonomy and uphold liberal-democratic values. Case studies such as Istanbul, Budapest, and the Pact of Free Cities illustrate how cities act as democratic enclaves, navigating structural constraints to mobilize resistance. By identifying research gaps and proposing new avenues for investigation, this article advances a research agenda that re-centers cities as critical actors in contemporary struggles for democracy.","PeriodicalId":51350,"journal":{"name":"Urban Studies","volume":"531 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.7,"publicationDate":"2025-11-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145478282","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
In New Zealand, and globally, concerns that living in areas of concentrated social housing will depress the outcomes of its tenants have led to policy directives to limit the proportion of social housing in any one community. This study explores the rationale for these initiatives through the innovative use of administrative linked data for 200,000 New Zealand social housing tenants. We analyse associations between the concentration of social housing (as measured by the proportion of social housing tenants relative to the rest of the area population) and their education and health outcomes seven-to-nine years later. We find that – contrary to policy assumptions – outcomes for social housing tenants are similar or slightly better when they have lived in areas with more concentrated social housing.
{"title":"The association between social housing concentration and the education and health outcomes of social housing tenants: A cross-sectional study of over 200,000 people in New Zealand","authors":"Ayodeji Fasoro, Elinor Chisholm, Philippa Howden-Chapman, Nevil Pierse","doi":"10.1177/00420980251376932","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00420980251376932","url":null,"abstract":"In New Zealand, and globally, concerns that living in areas of concentrated social housing will depress the outcomes of its tenants have led to policy directives to limit the proportion of social housing in any one community. This study explores the rationale for these initiatives through the innovative use of administrative linked data for 200,000 New Zealand social housing tenants. We analyse associations between the concentration of social housing (as measured by the proportion of social housing tenants relative to the rest of the area population) and their education and health outcomes seven-to-nine years later. We find that – contrary to policy assumptions – outcomes for social housing tenants are similar or slightly better when they have lived in areas with more concentrated social housing.","PeriodicalId":51350,"journal":{"name":"Urban Studies","volume":"46 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.7,"publicationDate":"2025-11-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145472991","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
In response to the global challenge of population ageing, active ageing has emerged as a key strategy. Urban parks, as core elements of an age-friendly city’s physical and social infrastructure, play a vital role in enhancing older adults’ well-being. This study aims to construct a framework for age-friendly park development integrating dual supply–demand perspectives. The framework systematically defines Space Friendly and Service Friendly attributes under the supply dimension, and Spatial Differences and Social Differences under the demand dimension. Space Friendly denotes the accessible, safe, and comfortable physical design of parks. Service Friendly encompasses soft services such as management, maintenance, and programming. Spatial Differences address heterogeneous demands arising from geographic location and park type. Social Differences focus on diverse needs stemming from socio-economic status. By utilizing the Coupling Coordination Degree Model (CCM) and the Entropy Weight Method, this study developed a comprehensive evaluation system. The model results indicated that Space Friendly and Service Friendly were weighted at 39.63% and 60.37%, respectively, while Spatial Differences and Social Differences were weighted at 44.28% and 55.72%, respectively. The results in the research area indicated that 8.11% of the blocks fell into the Disorder Recession Class, 24.33% belonged to the Transitional Development Class, and 67.56% were classified under Coordinated Development Class. Overall, the age-friendliness of park resources in the study area was relatively high. Nevertheless, significant spatial disparities existed between the central areas and peripheral areas. Based on the characteristics of different blocks, this study proposed targeted optimization strategies. By offering quantitative tools and strategic guidance, this research provides an interdisciplinary method on evaluating age-friendliness of urban park resources.
{"title":"Towards an evaluation framework for age-friendly parks: A supply–demand coordination perspective","authors":"Yilun Cao, Xinwei He, Yuhan Guo, Yuhao Fang, Kexin Huang, Shucheng Ai","doi":"10.1177/00420980251377531","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00420980251377531","url":null,"abstract":"In response to the global challenge of population ageing, active ageing has emerged as a key strategy. Urban parks, as core elements of an age-friendly city’s physical and social infrastructure, play a vital role in enhancing older adults’ well-being. This study aims to construct a framework for age-friendly park development integrating dual supply–demand perspectives. The framework systematically defines Space Friendly and Service Friendly attributes under the supply dimension, and Spatial Differences and Social Differences under the demand dimension. Space Friendly denotes the accessible, safe, and comfortable physical design of parks. Service Friendly encompasses soft services such as management, maintenance, and programming. Spatial Differences address heterogeneous demands arising from geographic location and park type. Social Differences focus on diverse needs stemming from socio-economic status. By utilizing the Coupling Coordination Degree Model (CCM) and the Entropy Weight Method, this study developed a comprehensive evaluation system. The model results indicated that Space Friendly and Service Friendly were weighted at 39.63% and 60.37%, respectively, while Spatial Differences and Social Differences were weighted at 44.28% and 55.72%, respectively. The results in the research area indicated that 8.11% of the blocks fell into the Disorder Recession Class, 24.33% belonged to the Transitional Development Class, and 67.56% were classified under Coordinated Development Class. Overall, the age-friendliness of park resources in the study area was relatively high. Nevertheless, significant spatial disparities existed between the central areas and peripheral areas. Based on the characteristics of different blocks, this study proposed targeted optimization strategies. By offering quantitative tools and strategic guidance, this research provides an interdisciplinary method on evaluating age-friendliness of urban park resources.","PeriodicalId":51350,"journal":{"name":"Urban Studies","volume":"21 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.7,"publicationDate":"2025-11-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145427722","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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