Changing welfare context and income segregation in Amsterdam and its metropolitan area, 2004-2011 (original) (raw)
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Income segregation in The Netherlands - trends and analysis
2005
Dutch society does not accept high levels of income segregation. This tendency has repeatedly been revealed in public opinion surveys. Dutch government intervenes on different levels trying to mix low and high income groups both between cities and suburbs, as well as within city neighborhoods. The question is to what extent the assumptions on actual concentration and differentiation of different income groups hold true if compared to real figures. This paper publishes income data at 500 by 500 meter cells, showing significant spatial patterns of distribution and growth of low and high income groups. Remarkably, high income groups appear to be more segregated than low income groups. All Dutch central city areas have regained high income groups in the period 1995-2000, while the reverse happens in all other city neighborhoods. Despite those tendencies, large parts of the cities have a mixed composition of low, medium and high income groups.
Just as urban renewal policies in the USA and many European countries, Dutch policies today aim to create a housing mix for different income groups in working class neighbourhoods. By building 'expensive' housing units, the middle classes are encouraged to settle in these neighbourhoods. These more affluent people are expected to bring more social capital into the neighbourhood, leading to stronger social cohesion, improved trust relations and increased participation in civic organisations. Moreover, the better-off are expected to prevent the poorer sections of society from falling into a culture of poverty by providing more positive role models. In other words, a new population mix is thought to lead to the increased liveability of the neighbourhood.
Urban Research & Practice, 2012
In the second half of the 1990s, Dutch urban housing policy shifted from urban renewal to urban restructuring and the creation of more socially mixed neighbourhoods. Motives for restructuring stem from the ongoing debates on concentration, segregation and social mix. Here, we focus on the main instruments of urban restructuring, that is, the demolition of social housing and the construction of more expensive rental and owner-occupied housing. Continued restructuring may eventually lead to a shortage of social rented dwellings for low-income households, the target group of social housing. An important political question is therefore whether the dwindling supply of social housing still matches the potential demand in the target group. We addressed this question with an analysis of three Dutch cities: Rotterdam, The Hague and Breda. The results indicate that, although demolition has brought about substantial changes, the share of social rented housing remains high in most restructuring neighbourhoods and restructuring has not resulted in concentrations of social rented housing in other, non-restructuring neighbourhoods in any of the three cities. In Rotterdam, which had a very large social housing stock at the beginning of the restructuring operation, there are still sufficient affordable homes for lower income households. However, in The Hague and Breda, restructuring has tightened the supply of social rental housing. The municipal authority in The Hague has attempted to remedy the situation by entering regional agreements to secure sufficient levels of affordable housing.
URBAN POLICY, HOUSING POLICY, AND THE DEMISE OF THE DUTCH WELFARE STATE
Tijdschrift voor Economische en Sociale Geografie, 1992
Relative poverty is defined by its context ; its nature and severity differs in space and time. A household is considered poor because others are better-off. This means that relative poverty always exists : there will always be households that are less well-off than others, even in a welfare state where the creation of equal opportunity is given high priority. Not only does the welfare state seek to ameliorate relative deprivation in a material sense :
Revolution in Social Housing in the Netherlands: Possible Effects of New Housing Policies
The social rented sector in the Netherlands has always had a very special status. Unlike many other countries, in the Netherlands this sector has never been regarded as a segment exclusively for low-income households. Consequently, neighbourhoods with large numbers of social rented dwellings have never been areas for low-income households only. Since about 1990, however, the proportion of low-income households in social rented housing has increased, while high-income households can be found more and more in the owner-occupied sector. At least for the 1990s, housing policies can be seen as partially responsible for this change. In this contribution, we argue that new housing policies in the Netherlands will probably have the effect of increasing the share of low-income households in social housing even more. This holds for the policy of urban restructuring, initiated in 1997, as well as for the newest plans of the State Secretary of Housing that were launched in his Housing Memorandum at the end of the year 2000. If the proposed housing policy is implemented in the near future, we doubt whether the status of social housing in the Netherlands will continue to be so different from that of other EU countries.
Remaking Urban Segregation: Processes of Income Sorting and Neighbourhood Change
Segregation studies have mainly focused on urban structures as a whole or have discussed specific (gentrifying or renewing) neighbourhoods. The literature suggests that changes in segregation occur primarily through selective migration. In this paper, we follow up on recent work that has questioned these orthodoxies, suggesting that in situ social mobility, and entries to and exits from the city population should be taken into account as well, and that dynamics in all neighbourhoods should be considered. The paper traces the processes by which segregation changes for the cities of Amsterdam and The Hague for 1999–2006, using a longitudinal individual-level database covering the entire population. It extends previous work by looking at income rather than socioeconomic status and by drilling down to the neighbourhood level. Applying an existing measure of segregation (Delta) in a novel way, the analysis focuses on changes in the spatial distribution of household income, measuring the relative contribution of a range of processes to changes in segregation. Results show that segregation rises in both cities but that different processes drive changes in each case. Furthermore, the aggregate change in segregation for each city masks a diversity of changes at the neighbourhood level, some of which tend to increase segregation while others tend to reduce it. Mapping these changes and the individual processes contributing to them shows that they have a distinct geography, which seems to be structured by historically specific trends in state and housing market context.
AFTER URBAN RESTRUCTURING: RELOCATIONS AND SEGREGATION IN DUTCH CITIES
Tijdschrift voor economische en sociale geografie, 2009
ABSTRACTt esg_555 502..518 Numerous studies have been devoted to documenting the shifting patterns of ethnic segregation in the cities of the Netherlands during the past few decades. But an analysis of residential mobility that would reveal the mechanisms of change has rarely been included. In this paper such household mobility is studied against the background of the current urban restructuring policy. This policy consists of the selective demolition of inexpensive rented housing and the construction of homeowner dwellings in its stead, leading to changes in the social make-up of neighbourhoods. The change is caused by the displacement of ethnic and other low-income households, the result of their decisions how to use the incentives to move offered by the policy. Thus, this paper deals with the question how urban restructuring affects segregation patterns. Ethnic and socioeconomic variables are at the core of the analysis. The outcome is that while the social make-up of neighbourhoods is altered, and low-income households shift in space, the displacement does not contribute to desegregation.
Trends in Dutch Housing Policy and the Shifting Position of the Social Rented Sector
Urban Studies, 2002
The housing system of the Netherlands has acquired an international reputation because of its special nature and the way it has evolved. In this contribution, we explain how the Dutch social rented sector came to have this specific character. We establish that the position of the social rented sector is strongly influenced by developments in society at large. In particular, its specific position may be explained with reference to the emergence and transformation of the Dutch welfare state. In the Netherlands, the development of the social rented sector coincided with the vigorous build-up of the welfare state. That sector continued to grow in the Netherlands for a longer period than in most other west European countries. Ultimately, the share of the Dutch social rented sector reached its highest point—41 per cent of the stock—at the beginning of the 1990s. The current position of the social rented sector in the Netherlands is determined not only by the structure of the Dutch welfare...