Urban Geographies of Hesitant Transition: Tracing Socioeconomic Segregation in Post‐Ceauşescu Bucharest

Abstract

Scholars have raised concerns about the social costs of the transition from state socialism to capitalism in Central and Eastern Europe, and geographers are particularly interested in the spatial expressions and implications of these costs, including apparently increasing residential segregation. Applying a range of segregation measures to 1992 and 2002 census data, this contribution studies socio-occupational residential segregation in Bucharest. The conclusion is that Bucharest was relatively socio-spatially mixed at both times; in fact, a modest, yet fully legible, decreasing overall trend is observable. This is at odds with many popular assumptions of the past 20 years.

Patterns of Socioeconomic Segregation in the Capital Cities of Fast-Track Reforming Postsocialist Countries

“…Interestingly, a similar shape characterized the segregation arcs observed for the socialist city (Lad anyi 1989;Marci nczak, Gentile, and Stępniak 2013;Marci nczak et al 2014). Despite the similarity of the segregation profiles, the levels of segregation were not the same in all cities.…”

“…There is general consensus in the literature that the implementation of socialist town planning principles and the administrative allocation of housing made socialist cities less segregated and more spatially homogenous than their capitalist counterparts (Szel enyi 1996;S ykora 2009;Gentile, Tammaru, and van Kempen 2012;Marci nczak, Gentile, and Stępniak 2013;Marci nczak et al 2014). Housing inequalities mattered more in the socialist context than spatial segregation per se (Bater 1980).…”

Spatial variation of in-migration to Moscow: Testing the effect of housing market

“…However, housing prices may vary greatly within the district due to the objective characteristics of the houses and the infrastructure. Such a mixed housing landscape is characteristic of many post-socialist cities (Marcińczak, Gentile, Rufat, & Chelcea, 2014;Sýkora, 2009). Under such conditions the average housing prices become a poor predictor even at the district level.…”

Deprived Urban Neighbourhoods in Poland – Risk of Intergenerational Transmission of Poverty and Social Exclusion

“…However, among CEE scholars (Sykora, 2009;Temelová et al, 2011;Cirman et al, 2013;Kovacs et al, 2013;Krisjane, Berzins, 2014;Marcińczak et al, 2014) an opinion prevails that the CEE cities are not socially segregated, which results from housing politics based on the rule of social mix. However, qualitative research carried out in Romania (Stănculescu, Berevoescu, 2004) and Poland (Warzywoda-Kruszyńska, 1998;Warzywoda-Kruszyńska, Jankowski, 2013), introduces some doubts about such conclusions.…”