The Determinants of Neighbourhood Dissatisfaction
Alison Parkes, Ade Kearns, Rowland Atkinson

This project uses data from the 1997/98 Survey of English Housing to identify and assess those factors which have most influence upon residents' sense of satisfaction with the neighbourhood around their homes. A number of statistical models are constructed to evaluate the impact upon the probability of someone being less than 'very satisfied' with their neighbourhood of a series of categories of variables including: socio-demographic characteristics; dwelling type; housing satisfaction; perceptions of neighbourhood quality and the incidence of different types of neighbourhood problem; and classification of area type. The analysis also examines how the influences upon neighbourhood satisfaction may vary between different types of area according to the personal and housing tenure characteristics of the residents.

CNR Paper 2: February 2002

Neighbourhood in a High Rise, High Density City: Some Observations
Contemporary Hong Kong
Ray Forrest, Adrienne La Grange, Yip Ngai-ming

Most of the recent and relevant research on the meaning of neighbourhood in the contemporary city comes from US or European sources. The conte xt for this research is often in sharp contrast to East Asian cities in terms of residential densities, the nature and history of the built form and in relation to ideas of community and kinship. As a contribution to filling this gap in the literature this paper reports some preliminary research on the meaning of neighbourhood in contemporary Hong Kong. As a precursor to a larger scale social survey exploratory interviews were carried out with a range of people in three different locations-a New Town estate, an older inner city area and a middle class housing estate. The interviews explored inter alia neighbourhood perceptions, ideas of community, sense of belonging and sense of place.

CNR Paper 3: March 2002

Residential Perceptions and Housing Mobility in Scotland: An analysis of the Longitudinal Scottish House Condition Survey 1991-1996
Alison Parkes, Ade Kearns,

This paper seeks to develop the evidence base for urban, neighbourhood and housing policies which aim to increase neighbourhood satisfaction and reduce residential instability. Using the longitudinal Scottish House Condition Survey 1991-96, we examine whether residential perceptions are generally significant predictors of individual house moving intentions and behaviours, taking into account factors related to life cycle stage, employment, tenure and type of neighbourhood. The effect of specific residential perceptions on overall satisfaction with the home and neighbourhood is traced through moving intentions to actual moves over the 1991-96 period. Using a sample of matching respondents surveyed twice in 1991 and 1996, we also examine whether changed residential perceptions affect moving intentions. There is evidence that deteriorating neighbourhood perceptions increase the likelihood that an individual would consider a house move, while greater satisfaction with the home is associated with reduced moving intentions.

CNR Paper 4: April 2002

The Neighbourhood and Social Networks
Gary Bridge

This narrative review synthesises the literature on social networks with the research evidence on neighbourhood-based social ties to explore the relationship between social networks and the neighbourhood. Is the neighbourhood a source of dense social ties or a stepping-stone to a more dispersed network of contacts? How do social networks relate to neighbourhood types and ideas of social capital? What sorts of resources are transacted in neighbourhood based networks? The review also looks at the form and function of networks to investigate certain policy concerns. Have networks replaced neighbourhoods for certain key resources? Can certain social ties provide a bridge to re-integrate excluded neighbourhoods.This is a comprehensive narrative review that has both academic and policy related objectives.

CNR Paper 5: June 2002

Does Gentrification Help or Harm Urban Neighbourhoods? : June 2002
Rowland Atkinson

This is a systematic review of the literature on gentrification since the mid 1960's. The review will cover all of the British literature and that part of the international literature which focuses on the neighbourhood impacts of gentrification. International mileposts in the theoretical consideration of gentrification will also be covered. A search will be made of the grey literature in the area through the use of the Gentrification jiscmail list and direct approaches to key researchers in the field. The review will exclude any material not in English and Eastern European literature which has focused on post-communist and new market reformed city contexts. The main aim of the review is to see whether the literature and research evidence base on gentrification has identified negative or positive effects on neighbourhoods. The review is being carried out in the context of the urban renaissance and Urban White Paper documents, both of which have stressed the need to make central city neighbourhoods more attractive to middle class residents.

CNR Paper 6: August 2002
Transforming the City: Post-Recession Gentrification and Re-urbanisation: Christine Lambert and Martin Boddy

CNR Paper 7: October 2002
Time-space Trajectories in Tentative Gentrification
Gary Bridge

In spite of the acknowledged arguments and evidence for a distinctive gentrification aesthetic, this paper argues that there are a range of socio-cultural/geographical destinations and housing choices of onward moving gentrifiers. Drawing on qualitative interviews in an inner Bristol (UK) neighbourhood, this paper offers some preliminary observations on the housing trajectories and strategies of a group of onward moving gentrifiers.

CNR Paper 8 : November 2002
Living In and Leaving Poor Neighbourhood Conditions in England
Ade Kearns and Alison Parkes

Current neighbourhood renewal and urban policies in the UK seek to improve neighbourhood conditions in poor areas and achieve greater residential stability. Using one of the few longitudinal housing data-sets available in the UK, this paper analyses the influence of residential perceptions on house moving behaviour in poor and other areas. It is found that residential dissatisfaction is notably higher among residents of poor areas, and they respond to poor neighbourhood conditions in the same way as the general population. Dissatisfaction with the home itself, and unhappiness with disorder in the immediate surroundings both significantly increased the odds that someone would move home. Perceived neighbourhood decline was also found to increase the odds that someone wished to move home but to reduce the likelihood that they would actually do so. Residential mobility was found to be a particular problem for owner occupiers in declining neighbourhoods and for residents in deprived parts of inner London.

CNR Paper 9 : December 2002
Public Opinion for Policy? Housing, Neighbourhoods and Communities in Scotland
Ade Kearns and Alison Parkes

This paper is based on an analysis of the Scottish Social Attitudes Survey 2001 (SSAS). This is an annual random sample survey of adults in Scotland conducted by the National Centre for Social Research, comprising around 1,600 interviews and self-completion questionnaires.

This paper is copyright ã Ade Kearns and Alison Parkes and was first published as a chapter in Devolution - Scottish Answers to Scottish Questions edited by Catherine Bromley, John Curtice, Kerstin Hinds and Alison Park, published by Edinburgh University Press, 2003: http://www.eup.ed.ac.uk/cgi/odbic.exe?input=NewWeb/Books/2562.htm

CNR Paper 10: February 2003
Locating the Local in Informal Processes of Social Control: The Defended Neighbourhood and Informal Crime Management
Rowland Atkinson and John Flint

This paper reflects on processes of informal control of social problems in affluent and deprived neighbourhoods. The paper attempts to understand how such control is exerted n these different social settings as part of a strategy to improve the quality of life in these neighbourhoods. Theories of social disorganisation have long been used to suggest that crime is higher in deprived areas because of lower social cohesion resulting from higher household mobility. This paper looks at processes of informal social control directed at threats, including here incivility, anti-social behaviour and crime, from both within and outside the neighbourhood. We find that social control based on cohesion (collective efficacy) could be found in both affluent and deprived neighbourhoods thus challenging both policy prescriptions on community safety and theories of social control by communities. However, this control tended to be less formalised in the deprived neighbourhoods.

CNR Paper 11: April 2003
Comparing Gentrification in South Parkdale, Toronto and Lower Park Slope, New York City: A ‘North American’ Model of Neighbourhood Reinvestment?
Tom Slater

This paper offers a response to several recent calls for a ?geography of
gentrification?, in the form of a comparative assessment of the gentrifying
neighbourhoods of South Parkdale, Toronto, Canada and Lower Park Slope, New York City, USA. Insights from in-depth interviews with displaced tenants,
politicians and gentrifiers are used to draw out two major themes. First,
gentrification is neither 'revanchist' nor 'emancipatory' in either case,
illustrating how the process has changed in recent years, and second,
references to a North American model of the process obscure some subtle
local and national differences between the gentrification of individual
neighbourhoods within that continent.

Anecdotal evidence contained in journalism and local observation suggests that gated communities are becoming more established as a new form of housing in the UK. However, robust evidence on the nature and location of such ‘communities’ is lacking in the British context. This comprehensive review located existing research literature with a view to understanding the wide-ranging implications of having enclave-style developments wherein the affluent “gate“ themselves off from the rest of society. The controversy over the perceived positive and negative impacts of such developments combined with a general absence of empirical reference points in this country make a review of such literature an important precursor to an informed debate.

This paper reports on the international empirical evidence on the impacts of gated communities, discusses the reliability of this evidence and comments on the research gaps this reveals as well as the policy implications arising from the evidence.

CNR Paper 13: July 2003
Community Involvement in Neighbourhood Regeneration: Stairway to Heaven or Road to Nowhere?
Paul Burton

State-sponsored programmes to regenerate relatively small areas or neighbourhoods in cities and other urban areas have for a long time stressed the importance of involving the residents of these areas in their design and execution. This commitment has been reinforced in recent years by the broader principles of participation and involvement embodied in the government's project of modernisation. However, the practice of participation and involvement has always been more patchy. This paper reviews studies of public participation in various neighbourhood regeneration programmes and distils key findings and recommendations for ensuring a greater degree of fit between policy and practice in this field.

CNR Paper 14: September 2003
Gating Communities for Children?: The Perennial Problem of School Choice, Residential Location and their (continuing) Relationship with Neighbourhood
Jacqui Croft

Housing and education are two aspects of social policy which form particularly important dimensions of the current debates around social stability and exclusion in neighbourhoods, particularly for those living within areas of deprivation. Differential access to quality education is a critical dimension of participation in or exclusion from the knowledge-based economy. In a housing market dominated by home ownership, access to oversubscribed schools can be determined by the ability to afford housing in particular areas and it might be suggested that, this being the case, school allocations procedures influence the composition of neighbourhoods around particular schools.

This paper looks at the evidence which exists on the relationship between school choice and housing, asking what is already known about how school choice influences decisions about where families live, or the overall composition of neighbourhoods?

 CNR Paper 15: April 2004
Social Capital, Regeneration and Urban Policy
Ade Kearns

This paper seeks to do a number of things. First, to give an account of the emergence of social capital as a very prominent element within policy discourse related to concerns with social exclusion and social inclusion. Second, to explain what is meant by the term social capital and describe its components and the forms it can take at the individual and collective or community level. Third, to show how social capital is linked to neighbourhood renewal goals such as community empowerment and to urban policy goals such as community cohesion. Lastly, to explain why the current Government is so keen on social capital, exploring its links to Third Way ideology, the objective of 'joined-up policy' and the broader aim of 'democratic renewal'.

The paper first appeared as a chapter in Imrie,R. and Raco,M. Eds. (2003) Urban Renaissance? New Labour, Community and Urban Policy. Bristol: The Policy Press.

CNR Paper 16: May 2004
The Role of Church of Scotland Congregations in Developing Social Capital in Scottish Communities: Enabling and Cohesive or Irrelevant and Divisive?
John Flint and Ade Kearns
This paper presents the findings from a national study of Church of Scotland congregations. It assesses the extent to which the activities of congregations contribute to social capital in Scottish communities. The paper identifies the challenges that congregations face in developing such a role and evaluates the impact of congregations on social cohesion. The paper concludes by discussing the implications of the findings for both the Church and policy-makers in Scotland.
Anecdotal evidence suggests that ‘gated communities’ are growing in popularity. This paper uses empirical evidence to profile the location and characteristics of gated development in England and details the relative integration of residents. The paper also attempts to think through the wider theoretical and urban policy impacts of gating. In contrast to the view that gated communities provide an extreme example of residential segregation we go further and argue that the time-space trajectories of residents suggest a dynamic pattern of separation that goes beyond the place of residence. Gated communities appear to provide an extreme example of more common attempts by other social groups to insulate against perceived risk and unwanted encounters. Patterns of what we term time-space trajectories of segregation can thereby be seen as closed linkages between key fields, such as work and home, which enable social distance to be maintained and perceived risks to be managed by elite social groups. We conclude that gated communities further extend contemporary segregatory tendencies in the city and that policy responses are required which curtail the creation of havens of social withdrawal.

CNR Paper 17: July 2004
Fortress UK? Gated Communities, The Spatial Revolt of the Elites and Time-Space Trajectories of Segregation
Rowland Atkinson and John Flint

Anecdotal evidence suggests that ‘gated communities’ are growing in popularity. This paper uses empirical evidence to profile the location and characteristics of gated development in England and details the relative integration of residents. The paper also attempts to think through the wider theoretical and urban policy impacts of gating. In contrast to the view that gated communities provide an extreme example of residential segregation we go further and argue that the time-space trajectories of residents suggest a dynamic pattern of separation that goes beyond the place of residence. Gated communities appear to provide an extreme example of more common attempts by other social groups to insulate against perceived risk and unwanted encounters. Patterns of what we term time-space trajectories of segregation can thereby be seen as closed linkages between key fields, such as work and home, which enable social distance to be maintained and perceived risks to be managed by elite social groups. We conclude that gated communities further extend contemporary segregatory tendencies in the city and that policy responses are required which curtail the creation of havens of social withdrawal.

CNR Paper 18: August 2004
How Would We Know What Works? Context & Complexity in the Evaluation of Community Involvement
Paul Burton, Robina Goodlad & Jacqui Croft

In 2002 the Home Office commissioned from us a review of research on community involvement in area-based initiatives (ABIs). Our review found comparatively few studies that set out to measure the impact rather than the extent of involvement and to answer the question of what works. This paper takes that finding as its starting point and tries to answer the question: how would we know what works in terms of community involvement in complex interventions like ABIs? It discusses the treatment of context and complexity in different evaluation designs and reflects on the difficulties associated with evaluating procedural as well as substantive aspects of interventions.

The paper argues that theory-based evaluations have the potential to deal with complexity and to allow contextual factors to be incorporated into empirical evaluations of ABIs. It concludes that intensive, qualitative methods and case study designs are more likely to generate robust answers to the question of what than experimental or quasi-experimental designs allied to more extensive methods.

CNR Paper 19: August 2004
The Multi-dimensional Neighbourhood and Health: A Cross-sectional Analysis of the Scottish Household Survey, 2001
Ade Kearns and Alison Parkes
Neighbourhoods may influence the health of individual residents in different ways: via the social and physical environment, as well as through facilities and services. Not all factors may be equally important for all population subgroups. A cross-sectional analysis of the Scottish Household Survey 2001 examined a range of neighbourhood factors for links with three health outcomes and two health-related behaviours. The results support the hypothesis that the neighbourhood has a multi-dimensional impact on health. There was also some evidence that the relationship between neighbourhood factors and health varied according to the population subgroup, although not in a consistent manner.

CNR Paper 20: August 2004
The Responsible Tenant: Housing Governance and the Politics of Behaviour
John Flint

Writers influenced by Foucault’s work on governmentality have characterised emerging forms of governance in advanced liberal democracies as being based upon ‘technologies of the self’ in which power works through the self- regulation of subjects within constructed norms of responsible and ethical conduct. This ‘politics of behaviour’ has been particularly prominent in UK housing policy debates in relation to anti-social behaviour, benefit reform and tenant participation. This paper argues that recent reforms are premised upon the identification of the responsible (and responsive) tenant as a central organising mechanism in new processes of housing governance. Although tenant responsibility is not a new concept, the paper argues that the nature and scope of this responsibility is currently being broadened and deepened, and discusses how this reconfiguration of responsibility reflects a wider realignment of governing identities within housing policy and practice.

CNR Paper 21: August 2004
Gated Cities of Today: Barricaded Residential Development in England
Rowland Atkinson , Sarah Blandy, John Flint and Diane Lister

This paper reports on research looking at the relative prevalence and underlying rationale for gated residential development across England. The research also had the objective of considering the immediate and likely future impacts of such development. Policy debates about lowering socio-spatial segregation and the encouragement of social mix to promote sustainable communities have generally ignored the upper end of the housing market and the clustering of affluent households which are perceived to produce few negative externalities or problems for residents. However, here we argue that gated development often creates a secondary set of problems which may also affect their residents as well as those living outside ‘fortified’ residential development. The research found around 1,000 gated developments in England at a time when the Government appears clear in its mission to provide socially diverse neighbourhoods as the hallmark of community sustainability. We conclude that this initial profiling of gated communities highlights the need for informed debate regarding the relative social costs and benefits imposed by gating.

CNR Paper 22: September 2004
The Relative Power of Type of Neighbourhood vis a vis Person and Household Level Demographic Variables as Discriminators of Consumer Behaviour
Richard Webber

Geodemographics is a field of study which involves the classification of consumers according to the type of neighbourhood in which they live. As a method of segmenting consumers it has long been of value to direct marketers who, being often unable to identify the age, marital status or occupational status of people in mailing lists, found it a useful means of applying selectivity to their mail shots. By analysing the behavioural characteristics of consumers in different types of neighbourhoods they found they could improve business performance by targeting promotional activities to names and addresses falling within specific types of postcode. From direct marketing the application of geodemographics spread to the targeting of door to door distribution and customer communications and to the retail industry where it was found to be useful input into the process of deciding where to site new outlets. Government is increasingly using such methods to improve the targeting of its own communications to tailor local service delivery to the particular needs of local communities.

During the 25 years since geodemographics was first introduced few users have had a clear understanding of precisely neighbourhood differences come about. Are differences in consumption patterns at neighbourhoods level simply the predictable result of differences in the age, household composition, educational status or occupational profile of their residents? Or do additional, incremental neighbourhood effects operate? When deciding neighbourhoods to live in do people select ones whose values and consumer preferences are broadly similar to their own? Or is it only after they have moved that their behaviours change, as they become subject, consciously or not, to the prevailing ethos of the new community in which they find themselves?

To set these alternative explanations this study analyses a random set of consumer behaviours covered by the Target Group Index, one of a number of market research surveys whose respondents have been coded by the type of neighbourhood in which they live; it uses a statistic to measure the extent to which the Mosaic geodemographic system is effective in discriminating on these behaviours; it then measures the relative effectiveness of other frequently used household and person level demographics in predicting of these behaviours; finally it compares the predictive efficiency of different discriminators.

The conclusion that can be drawn from the exercise is that, across these behaviours as whole, the type of neighbourhood in which a consumer lives is a significantly more predictive piece of information that any person or household level discriminator (such as age or social grade). By implication therefore it is almost certain that significant neighbourhood effects must operate for many of the behaviours tested. However the relative discriminatory power of geodemographics and person and household level discriminators varies considerably from behaviour to behaviour. Even when taking measures of status which one might have expected to be highly correlated, such as social grade, terminal education age or household income, there are considerable differences in their relative predictiveness across most consumer behaviours.

CNR Paper 23: November 2004
Identifying Robust, Parsimonious Neighborhood Indicators
George Galster, Chris Hayes, Jennifer Johnson

Identifying a few indicators that summarily tracked key dimensions of neighborhoods would be invaluable for neighborhood monitoring and measuring impacts of interventions. Our goal is to search empirically for such robust, parsimonious indicators. In five cities we analyze the interrelationships among a broad set of census tract indicators related to: mortgage market activity; home prices; jobs and firms; demographic, socio-economic, and housing stock characteristics; crime; and public assistance and health. Through factor analysis we identify four to six neighborhood dimensions among these indicators that are common across cities. Using regression we identify a parsimonious number of indicators that are inexpensive, annually updated, and available for all U.S. communities, yet robustly capture significant variation in these neighborhood dimensions. Home Mortgage Disclosure Act (HMDA) data on mortgage approval rates, loan amounts, and loan applications, and Dunn and Bradstreet data on businesses comprise such a set for four of the dimensions.

Neighbourliness and neighbouring are assumed to be important ingredients of a healthy, social cohesive society. But to what extent and in what ways do neighbours still matter to us? Do we know many of our neighbours, socialise with them or merely exchange a casual hello in the street? Does the degree of neighbouring vary between neighbourhood types, social groups or life cycle stages? This paper will provide a systematic review of the available British evidence on these issues. The review will focus on the empirical literature over the last two decades, encompass the full range of research methodologies and involve special analysis of key social surveys containing relevant data.

CNR Paper 25: November 2004
E-Neighbourhoods
Gary Bridge, Susy Giullari,

This narrative review assesses the impact of information technology on the functioning and role of residential neighbourhoods. It pursues a range of questions. To what extent does the global reach of the Internet and the World Wide Web render neighbourhood and neighbours irrelevant? Alternatively does this technology foster a re-assertion of neighbourhood in terms of local ties and information or the provision of services and democratic accountability - in the way that is being argued for Virtual Cities? Are there information rich and information poor neighbourhoods, and can information technology itself be used to bridge the gap and overcome social exclusion in a way assumed by the UK Government's 'Wired Communities' initiative? Can IT provide a focus (via message boards etc) for neighbourhood activities? To what extent does the information available on the Internet affect the reputation of different neighbourhoods? Does information technology extend the reach of neighbourhoods by providing weak ties everywhere or leave it vulnerable to global pinpoint marketing strategies? To what extent is the technology used passively or actively? Can the hardware of information technology be shared as a neighbourhood resource? Are functions and activities traditionally associated with place neighbourhoods now occurring in placeless cyberspace? In sum this paper explores the articulations between neighbourhood functions and the various forms of information technology, the e-neighbourhood as "virtual" and "real".

CNR Paper 26: November 2004
Who Cares About Neighbourhoods?
Ray Forrest

CNR Paper 27: November 2004
Measuring the Impact of CDBG Spending on Urban Neighborhoods
George Galster, Chris Walker, Chris Hayes , Patrick Boxall, Jennifer Johnson

We empirically investigate Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) Program spending in census tracts in 17 large cities. Regression analysis reveals several strong statistical associations between CDBG spending during 1994-96 and changes between 1993-94 and 1998-99 in three indicators that capture a wide range of neighborhood conditions, though their magnitudes are heavily contingent. First, there is no consistent association between CDBG spending levels and indicators of subsequent neighborhood change unless CDBG expenditures: (1) are sufficiently spatially targeted that they exceed a threshold of the sample mean expenditure level, and (2) are measured relative to the number of poor residents in the neighborhood. Second, associations vary according to neighborhood trajectories prior to investment and contemporaneous changes in the local economy. Nevertheless, even in the least-hospitable contexts—highly concentrated neighborhood poverty, pre-existing declines in neighborhood home values, weak city job growth—our estimates are consistent with the hypothesis that CDBG spending at above-threshold amounts produces significant neighborhood improvements according to multiple measures. We discuss implications for spatially targeting CDBG monies and connections of our work with emerging literature on the dynamics of poor neighborhoods.

CNR Paper 28: December 2004
Neighbourhood and Neighbouring in a Chinese City: Aspects of Local Social Relations in Contemporary GuangZhou
Ray Forrest and Yip Ngai-ming (City University of Hong Kong)

There is now a substantial and growing literature on various aspects of contemporary Chinese urbanization. However, few studies of Chinese cities have examined social change and social interaction at the level of the urban neighbourhood. This is in sharp contrast to a western literature where the neighbourhood has been a focus for considerable research and debate. This paper seeks to fill some of this gap in knowledge. It draws on a social survey of three contrasting neighbourhoods undertaken in Guangzhou in the Pearl River Delta, one of the most economically dynamic and rapidly urbanizing areas in the world. The paper explores inter alia the meaning of neighbourhood, sense of local belonging and community and patterns and incidence of mutual assistance. The paper reflects on the extent to which market reforms are transforming patterns of local social interaction and points to specific features of the neighbourhood in Chinese cities.

CNR Paper 28: November 2005

Neighbourhoods and the Impacts of Social Mix: Crime, Tenure Diversification and Assisted Mobility
Rowland Atkinson

This report is part one in a series each of which focuses on different thematic aspects of empirical research on diversity. In this report we focus on: crime and social diversity and studies of tenure diversification and household mobility