Gentrification and displacement: a review of approaches and findings in the literature

Gentrification and displacement: a review of approaches and findings in the literature Gentrification and displacement: a review of approaches and findings in the literature authored by Rowland Atkinson and Maryann Wulff for the Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute Southern and Monash Research Centres March 2009 AHURI Positioning Paper No. [...] In Australia, gentrification has now been noted by a number of researchers (Shaw, 2005; Bounds, 2002) but it is in the context of the most recent economic and housing booms that we now ask: How has the gentrification of metropolitan suburbs affected the availability of affordable housing and what are the impacts of these shifts on low-income households? In cities like Melbourne and Sydney gentrifi. [...] The scope of the review was international, reflecting the fact that most of the advances in this field have come in particular from the US and the UK. [...] Clearly what makes the gentrification debate so difficult and so interesting is the interaction between our own political standpoint and the phenomenon – where neoliberalism sees the market salvation of the inner-city – others, generally of the political left, point to the damaging entrenchment of social relations and displacement. [...] Research (Atkinson, 2000) on displacement suggests a range of outcomes from gentrification-related displacement including: a loss of housing options for growing sections of the community and a loss of the demographic and social mix that comes with housing tenure diversity and cost variability; fewer housing options for the more vulnerable members of the community; effects on the psychological heal.