NEIL SMITH: GENTRIFICATION IN BERLIN AND THE REVANCHIST STATE

By: Neil Smith, Jens Sambale, Volker Eick

Neil Smith, author of the seminal book "The urban frontier" (1996) and countless articles on gentrification, spatial scales, globalization and state revanchism, came to Berlin in May and agreed to answer a few of our questions concerning gentrification in Berlin.

Neil Smith

This interview should and would have been published in a much more timely fashion - alas the revanchist state himself decided to intervene and incarcerated our friend Andrej (based on his research on gentrification, see "Related News" below), who formulated the questions below.
Neil was in fact very supportive on behalf of the campaign to drop the baloney charges.

Our initial motivation to do the interview was the local/national misconception of gentrification as a mere market process. Again and again this summer (and before and since) the media and mainstream sociologist (mis-) informed the public by watering down the inherently violent and state supported process to something like: "Gentrification: Poor people move out, rich people move in. Fancy English word for common stuff".

This interview is not going to change that, but at least we tried :-)

Thanks to the Berlin Mieterecho for the permission to publish the English version. A German translation and additional information is available at their website [PDF, Issue 234].

And special thanks to Neil Smith for his time and support, we owe you one! 

[MIETERECHO/POLICING CROWDS] In Berlin we find different grades of gentrification due to the Berlin wall. In some areas in West-Berlin gentrification started decades ago, in some quarters in East-Berlin the gentrification process is quite dynamic. You
have been analyzing gentrification processes for nearly 30 years. How do
you describe the general principals of such urban dynamics?

[NEIL SMITH] Gentrification occurs in urban areas where prior disinvestment in the urban infrastructure creates urban neighborhoods that can be profitably redeveloped. In its earliest form, gentrification affected decaying working class neighbourhoods close to urban centers where middle and upper middle class people colonized or re-colonized the area, leading to the displacement and eviction of existing residents. The central mechanism behind gentrification can be thought of as a 'rent gap'. When neighborhoods experience disinvestment, the ground rent that can be extracted from the area declines meaning lower land prices. As this disinvestment continues, the gap between the actual ground rent in the area and the ground rent that could be extracted were the area to undergo reinvestment becomes wide enough to allow that reinvestment to take place. This rent gap may arise largely through the operation of markets, most notably in the United States, but state policies can also be central in encouraging disinvestment and reinvestment associated with gentrification. But only wealthier people are able to afford the costs of this renewed investment. Integral with these economic shifts are social and cultural shifts that change the kinds of shops, facilities and public spaces in a neighbourhood. Early examples of gentrification might include the Islington area of London or Greenwich Village in Manhattan but by the 1970s there were many recorded cases of gentrification in Europe, North America and Australia. In Berlin, early examples of gentrification were recorded in Schöneberg and Kreuzberg, among other neighbourhoods, but the fall of the Berlin Wall released a huge stock of housing that had undergone considerable disinvestment, leading to a widespread gentrification of Prenzlauer Berg and Mitte.