Two of a kind: The social-physical dynamics of neighborhood renewal

“Doing, thinking, feeling home” - 14/15 October - Delft, The Netherlands

Two of a Kind: the social-physical dynamics of

neighborhood renewal

Peter van der Graaf University of Amsterdam

Amsterdam School of Social science Research, pvandergraaf@uva.nl Tel. (+31 20) 525 1804, Fax (+31 20) 525 2446

Keywords: urban renewal; identity; place attachment

Abstract

My PhD research focuses on the effects of different social-physical interventions in urban renewal programs. Are residents better of in restructured neighborhoods or do problems of deprivation remain? Moreover, how are successful transformations achieved and which

interventions are less effective? Although scientists and professionals in the field of housing agree that neighborhood renewal is more the (re-) stacking of stones, there is considerable debate on the question of how social and spatial interventions can be combined in neighborhood renewal. My research aims at deeper understanding of the ways spatial interventions and social processes influence one another, in order to develop effective combinations. Based on the theoretical concept of identity dynamics and place attachment I will analyze the relationship between people and places to explain how social interactions, framed as identity processes, influence place attachment and place identity and in turn influence the usage of places. In urban renewal these dynamics are especially pressing: social network are uprooted and places in the neighborhood become more contested as new groups enter and claim their territory while the remaining residents try to maintain their place identity and sense of community. By researching this relationship with both quantitative and qualitative data I hope to provide new knowledge and tools in the future for more effective combinations of social and physical interventions in neighborhood renewal.

Introduction

Many housing associations in Western Europe are faced with persistent social issues. The popular neighborhoods of the past, situated on the outskirts of city centers, are nowadays characterized by a low-income population, high unemployment levels, high crime statistics, racial issues and low amounts of social capital among its residents. However, the problem is not exclusively a social issue. The housing stock in these neighborhoods does not comply anymore with the housing demands of today’s market. The houses, mainly built shortly before or after World War II, are too small, often poorly maintained and based on a lifestyle that has rapidly changed and diversified over the last six decades. In short, the problem is as much a spatial issue as a social problem. The double-sided nature of the issue was central to the big cities policy initiated by the mayors of the four biggest cities in the Netherlands. This policy rests on three ‘pillars’

(economical, spatial and social), indicating the importance of collaborate action between the spatial and social sector. In practice, however, each pillar developed it own programs with very few collaborations between the different sectors, causing neighborhood renewal to be dominated by spatial redesigning. Housing associations and policymakers assumed that they could kill two birds with one stone (solve both types of problems with one type of intervention, i.e. spatial). Large parts of old neighborhoods were to be demolished and replaced by a more diversified housing stock to cater for different population groups. This would not only solve the problem of a mismatch on the housing market, but would also benefit the people living in these

neighborhoods. By attracting higher income groups to poor city areas the less fortunate living there would benefit from the economical and social capital these groups would bring along.

Many professionals and scientists have disputed this assumption over the years and have been supported by research. Blokland (2001) showed for example that higher income people do not posses more social capital and Kleinhans, Veldboer and Duyvendak (2000) demonstrated that even under this assumption mixed neighborhoods do not lead to more economically and socially vital communities. ‘Meeting’ (the possibility of contact) rarely leads to ‘mating’ (engaging into meaningful contact), because residents prefer to interact with people who are more like them. Instead of interacting with each other, different groups are living together apart. Therefore housing associations motivate their plans nowadays with different arguments and are increasingly trying to combine spatial and social interventions in neighborhood renewal. This takes the debate in a new direction: were previously the debate on neighborhood renewal was dominated by spatial redesigning, assuming both spatial and social problems would be drawn away by landscape architects, nowadays, the combining of spatial and social programs in general and the social effects of spatial interventions in particular are central to the debate on urban renewal.

Various scholars in the social sciences are wary of this undertaking and list many differences between social and spatial processes, which make combined interventions difficult or even impossible in their views. Some scholars are more optimistic and argue that combined social and spatial interventions are possible under strict conditions. However, these conditions remain unclear and uncertain. Different studies suggest that the social effects of spatial interventions are unclear and not as straightforward as presumed. This has not stopped housing associations and community workers from experimenting with different projects with combined spatial and social interventions. In spite of these efforts, the present debate on the subject is lacking conceptual clarity, reducing the focus of the experiments to a debate on the control of process variables: how can social programs be adjusted to the design and planning? What is lacking is a debate of the social and spatial effects of combined interventions. Are residents better of in restructured neighborhoods or do problems of deprivation remain? Do the original residents return to the neighborhood or are their renewed houses taken over by middle and upper class citizens who can afford the extra rent or sale price, forcing them to cheaper housing elsewhere? Does the renewed housing stock meet the demands of the today’s market? Instead the debate focuses on questions of process improvement: how can residents be involved in the planning process (reducing social programs to citizen’s participation) in order to prevent costly court cases and other potential delays caused by residents’ resistance to the developed plans? Which mix of dwellings is desirable to cater for different customers? Which part of the housing stock needs to be demolished and which part can be saved by upgrading en redesigning? The efforts of housing associations and local governments to combine social and spatial interventions are hindered by conceptual anemia; the debate is reduced to question of process improvement. Whereas in the old debate attention was lacking to the social effects of predominantly spatial interventions, in the present debate hardly any attention is paid to the effects of combined spatial and social interventions.

A new direction in the debate and practice on urban renewal seems justified that draws attention to spatial and social effects of combined neighborhood interventions. Moreover, to understand why some combinations are/ might be more successful than others, a deeper understanding is necessary of the mechanisms behind these combinations. What are the

dynamics between social interaction and the spaces in which these interactions take place will be studied in each case? How do social interactions shape the usage of space and visa versa? I will address this question in the paper. The paper is part of the puzzle I am trying to solve as a PhD student at the University of Amsterdam. With the answer I hope to be able to address the key question of my research: How are the social interactions of residents and users of neighborhood space connected to the spatial structure of the neighborhood and how can this connection be utilized in neighborhood renewal? In this paper I will develop theoretical guidelines to research this connection.

Theoretical framework

I will argue that social interactions and the physical settings where these interactions take place are intrinsically connected: social behavior is influence by the design of places and the quality of spaces is in turn influenced by the social behavior that takes place in these spaces. This insight is not new, however, many attempts to use this relationship have failed in the past: all to often a new build environment is not used the way it was intended by the designers, illustrating that this is not a straightforward relationship that can easily be manipulated. Many post-war

neighborhoods that were designed with a specific ideology in mind, often based of the ideal of a self-supporting community, are classified today as deprived areas and targeted for urban renewal and major ‘restructurering’ programs. To provide a more lasting answer to the question raised in this paper I will (briefly) examine the scientific debate on the relationship between humans and their environment. The study of this relationship is a fundamental subject of scientific debate and can draw on an abundance of research and theory generated in different scientific disciplines as geography, history, philosophy, sociology, and anthropology. It is impossible to due justice to this volume of knowledge in the scope of this paper. I will focus on two concepts, identity dynamics and place attachment, which are central to my argument.

Place attachment

Studying the scientific literature on the relationship between humans and their environment one is confronted with many different concepts and notions. There are many similar terms such as community attachment, sense of community, place identity, place dependence, sense of place, place attachment, etc. These different notions are seemingly interconnected and are often used interchangeably without much attempt to distinguish them from each other. This makes the concept of place attachment a slippery term and difficult to define. In an overview of the research Setha Low and Irwin Altman conclude that:

Place attachment is a complex phenomenon that incorporated several aspects of people-place bonding. This means that place attachment has many inseparable, integral, and mutually defining features, qualities, or properties; it is not composed of separate or independent parts, components, dimensions or factors” (1993:4).

The basic assumption behind these notions, however, is a simple one: “In general, place attachment is

defined as an affective bond or link between people and specific places.” (Hidalgo and Hernandez, 2001: 274).

Places are not just a stage for social action, battle scenes for power and status, but are linked to people by an affective bond. This observation is one of the hallmarks op place attachment.

The concept of place attachment dates back to the sixties and then was primarily of interest to earlier phenomenological scholars such as Bachelard (1964) and Eliade (1959). They emphasized the emotional experiences and bonds of people with places, particularly homes and

sacred places. Unfortunately their work resonated poorly among many environment and behavior researchers whose work was dominated by positivist philosophies, leaving little room for

emphasis on unique, subjective experiences. More recently the subject gained renewed interest among scientists, particularly in geography and anthropology. Geographers’ focus on regional studies has sparked their interest in human action and an acknowledgement of the cultural significance of everyday life. Anthropologists on the other hand were criticised for their unproblematic treatment of place: places were merely settings, albeit exotic ones, were things happened.

Insufficient attention has been paid to conceptualizing place in anthropology as something other than a physical setting or a passive target for primordial sentiments of attachment that flow from life’s ‘assumed givens’ (Geertz, 1973:259).

To readdress these critics anthropologist started paying attention to the material and spatial aspects of culture and acknowledged space as an essential component of social-cultural theory.

The bond between people and places is captured in the meaning of the words

attachment and place. According to Low and Altman ‘attachment’ emphasizes affect, while the word ‘place’ focuses on the environmental setting to which people are emotionally and culturally attached: “Place is a space that has been given meaning through personal, group, or cultural processes” (p. 5). This points to a mutually constituting relationship and not just a conditional one, where places set the scene for human (inter) action, but a dynamic process in which people express their identity and the usage of space is determined. Cuba and Hummon (1993) make a distinction between the display and affiliation function of place attachment. Display is concerned with the communication of qualities of the self to self or other. In this view places are involved in the construction of personal and social identities. Affiliation focuses on the use of places to forge a sense of attachment or home. Display is emphasized in the concept of place identity. In general terms, place identity can be defined as an interpretation of self that uses environmental meaning to symbolize or situate identity. Like other forms of identity, place identity answers the question ‘ Who am I?’ by countering ‘ Where am I?’ or ‘ Where do I belong?’ (Cuba and Hummon, 1993: 112). The latter, the usage of space, is emphasized in the concept sense of place and community. In using a place people acquire a sense of attachment or home. Such identification with place often involves emotional ties to place.

Central to both dimensions is the idea that people form meaningful relationships with the locales they occupy, and in doing so attach meaning to space and transform ‘space’ into ‘place’. Low and Altman talk of ‘inscribes space’ implying that humans ‘write’ in an enduring way their presence on their surroundings” (p. 13). The transformation of space in place emphasis the importance of social action and interaction in place attachment. Although place attachment implies that the primary target of affective bonding of people is to environmental settings

themselves, a number of scholars indicate that attachment to place is more based on other people – family, friends, community, and even culture.

The social relations that a place signifies maybe equally or more important to the attachment process than the place qua place (Low, 2003: 7). Or as Riley remarks: It may not be attachment to a particular place that is central; rather, it may be affective attachments to ideas, people, psychological states, past experiences, and culture that is crucial (cited in Low, 2003: 10).

It is through the vehicle of particular environmental settings that these individual, group, and cultural processes are manifested. Place acts more as a medium for cultural processes. (In these processes meanings are established and exchanged).

Other scholars take this a step further and not only view places as a medium for cultural process, but as social constructions themselves. Margaret Rodman (2003): “Places are socially

constructed by the people who live in them and know them; they are politicized, culturally relative, historically specific, local and multiple constructions”. Many scholars are indebted to the work of Henri Lefebvre on

the production of space. Lefebvre (1991): “Space is permeated with social relations; it is not only supported

by social relations but it is also producing and produced by social relations”. However, Lefebvre does not

explain how places are socially constructed: how is the affective bond between people and places established, how are place identities formed and how do people attach meaning to places? He is more interested in the finished product: for him space is very much ‘a social and political product, something that ‘one buys and sells’ (Unwin, 1999: 22). The emphasis Lefebvre places on the production of space overemphasizes according to Tim Unwin space as a finished product, which draws the attention away from the process of space construction. Unwin:

Lefebvre claims that social space incorporates social actions, the actions of subjects both individual and collective who are born and who die, who suffer and who act, but in practice, these very people seem to be subsumed within a dehumanized conception of space” (1999: 23).

He therefore pleads for a more attention in research to ‘the complex everyday lived processes’ by focusing on the term construction of places1_.

This raises the issues of ‘social production of space’ versus ‘social construction of space‘. The difference between these terms is more than a play with words: production implies that space is something that can be planned in advance, that can be by made according to a set procedure and within a certain timeframe: a place can be finished. Social construction on the other hand implies that that a place is never finished, because it is a temporary construction by certain people at a certain time and place, which is de- and reconstructed as people who use the place come and go in time. Low offers an easy way out by defining production and construction of space ad two mutually complementary perspectives.

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Unwin also suggests the abandonment of the concept of space altogether. According to Unwin Lefebvre uses space to refer only to a space of nature untrammeled by human intervention, which can be replaced by the notion of space as a product. Lefebvre uses the term place and space inconsistently;

The social production of space includes all those factors – social, economical, ideological, and technological – the intended goal of which is the physical creation of the material setting. [..] The term social construction may then be conveniently reserved for the phenomenological and symbolic experience of space as mediated by social processes such as exchange, conflict, and control. Thus the social construction of space is the actual

transformation of space – through people’s social exchanges, memories, images, and daily use of the material setting – into scenes and actions that convey symbolic meaning”. (Low, 1996: 861-862).

The production of space creates the material settings, in which the construction of space, the imbuing of space with symbolic meaning takes place, transforming space into place. What she is actually saying, is that the real deal is happing in the construction of space, where the actual transformation of space takes place, whereas production of space is nothing more that the material context in which these this transformation takes places. She is therefore in danger of receiving the same criticism that earlier anthropologists endured to who ‘places were merely settings were things happened’.

Cuba and Hummon (1993) criticize in the conceptual study on place attachment the strong emphasis in research on the social construction of space.

We observe that most of them [studies on place attachment] have only considered place as social environment, thus assuming that attachment is directed to such environments [..] From this perspective we might be led to assume that place attachment is in reality attachment to people who live in that place.” (275).

Following Riger and Lavrakas (1981) they distinguish between two dimensions of place

attachment: rootedness or physical attachment and bonding or social attachment. They stress the need to take into account the physical component of the place, which is often neglected in studies on place attachment. Furthermore they criticize the unambiguous use place. Not much attention is paid in research to the different spatial levels of places towards which attachment is developed. Most studies focus on the neighborhood or community level. The few studies that analyze different spatial levels indicate that neighborhood is not the most important level of attachment (Kasarda and Janowitz, 1974)2_.

Identity dynamics

To answer to question how places are socially constructed taking into account the role of the physical component in the construction of places I turn to the work of Anthony Cohen (2003). As a leading anthropologist Cohen has coined the concept of identity dynamics, which I will use

with place he refers primarily to the everyday and the lived, while he reserves the word space for a more abstract and intellectual conception (1999:26).

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Kasarda and Janowitz (1974) analyzed the attachment of inhabitants of a Massachusetts county to their environment on three different levels: house, community and region and found that only 10.3 percent identified only with their community, compared to 13 percent with their house and 16 percent with the region. Therefore they conclude that ‘towards the most studied place the least number of people feel attached’; a result that is underlined and specified in their own research.

to make the connection between social behavior and physical settings. I will define his concept with four notions: constructivist, multi-locality, dynamic, and context/space bound. The first notion starts with the central preposition of place attachment: place is a social construction, more specifically a construction of identity. I define identity as a dimension of human interaction. When we communicate with others we are not only expressing what we are thinking (contents dimension) and what our relation is to the others we are communicating with (relational dimension), but we also express who we are, what our identity is. Human interaction

materialized into a ‘sediment' of identity: a sense of a feeling who we are, to who and who not we belong, how we do the things we do. These feelings are more abstractly labeled as identity and culture. Because identities are formed and expressed in human interaction they are constructions. In the course of our live we build this construction and use her to tell other people ‘who we are’. These constructions arise and change in our daily interactions with others, but also remain in some ways consistent, because new interactions are evaluated in the light of previous interactions and the meaning we inferred from them. New interactions build on the existing meaning systems that we constructed.

Secondly, identity is a plural concept. Personal identity is not based on one type of lifestyle or network, but on a whole pattern of relations that we maintain with others. People are not only part a family, but of different friendship groups, colleagues networks, sport societies and many other networks people join in the course of their lives. The neighborhood can be one of these networks. With each group an individual shares experiences and based in these experiences norms and values. Identity is thus a plural notion. And therefore the construction of identity has to by understood from multiple viewpoints. The relevance of plural groups bonds is increased in a globalizing society where we and our networks become more mobile. Different scientists (o. a. Castells, 1997) have pointed to the relation between identity and globalization causing people to change increasingly faster from position (in their networks) and therefore of the identity to assume/ express to other people. Identities are always in motion, caused by the social

interactions that people engage in with each other. Depending on the persons we meet or the contexts in which we move, we accentuate different aspects of our identities. Change of context not only causes identities to collide and differ, but also to change. In interaction with different groups and contexts, meanings are adjusted or new meanings arise. The giving of meaning to actions never ceases, but is a process that redefines and reconstitutes itself continuously. Identity is, in other words, a dynamic process. Scientists as Cohen therefore rather speak of identity dynamics or identity processes instead of the more static notion of identity. The dynamics of which Cohen speaks are present at different levels in society that mutually influence each other, ranging from the street and neighborhood level to the scale of entire cities and regions and also play at the international stage.

The exchange of meanings is not limited to persons. Objects and rituals can acquire meaning based on their place in the human interactions; they can be ‘charged’ with meaning. The same can also happen with neighborhoods. Individuals, and the groups they belong to, use these spatial meanings to express who they are and where they belong. Cohen defines them as

‘symbolic and ideological map references' that people use as markers to for the communities they belong to. In the same way neighborhoods can have a symbolic function/ meaning. However, identity is not passive sediment, a byproduct of human interaction and nothing else. It is at the same time a productive power that can strengthen or destroy a place. It is also a sense of

familiarity or an image through which a place acquires possibilities that other places do not offer. By charging a place with meaning, certain groups can identity with it, stimulating certain activities and interactions in that place.

This is meant when Low speaks of ‘imbuing places with meaning’. With identity

dynamics we are able to explain how places are imbued with meaning: they become symbolic and ideological map references for the communities people belong to. Place are more than social constructions, they are material markers for the personal and group identities that people construct in their daily interactions. They are not merely setting but play an active role in the construction of identity. As symbols they can have different meanings for different people. Margeret Rodman (2002) uses the notion of multilocality to describe the diverse meanings of place symbols. “Place can have a unique reality for each inhabitant, and while the meanings may be shared with

others, the views of place are often likely to be competing, and contested in practice.” (p. 208). According to

Rodman places have multiple meanings that are constructed spatially and therefore to understand the construction of places they needs to be analyzed from multiple viewpoints. Moreover, she states, in line with the comments of Cuba and Hummon, that identities need to be analyzed from different places: “Some activities arise from the actions of multiple agents in different places and can only be

understood by identifying both intended and unintended consequences in the network op complex connections within a system of places.” She stresses the constructive and hence temporary nature of place attachment:

“The social contested, dynamic construction of places represents the temporary grounding of ideas”. People attach meaning to places in the process of producing and reproducing their identities. Low point to this connection:

The social relations that a place signifies maybe equally or more important tot the attachment process than the place qua place [..] It is through the vehicle of particular environmental settings that individual, group, and cultural processes are manifested. [..]. Extending to this idea, place attachment may contribute to the formation, maintenance, and preservation of the identity of a person, group, or culture” (Low & Altman,

1993:7).

By using the concept of identity dynamics this relationship is reversed: social interactions, framed as identity processes, influence place attachment and place identity and in turn influence the usage of places.

In urban renewal these dynamics are especially pressing: social network are uprooted and places in the neighborhood become more contested as new groups enter and claim their territory while the remaining residents try to maintain their place identity and sense of home and community. To understand the effects of different social-physical interventions the changes in place attachments need to be studied: How do changes in the social and physical environment of the neighborhoods affect the place identity and sense of home of the people that live3 _{there? Are}

symbolic and ideological map references changed, destroyed or recreated? How are these identity dynamics changed with the uprooting of social networks and the arrival of new residents and users? Research shows that individuals who identify strongly with a locale are likely to experience emotional grief if they are forced to move.

How to measure place attachment?

Qualitative data

To measure place attachment several concepts are relevant: to analyze the social construction of places, data is needed on social interactions, specifically on the meanings exchanged in these interactions and in reference tot the places where these interactions take place and the people that participate in these interactions at different times. This requires rich qualitative data that can only be gathered by long-term observations and in-depth interviews. A good example is the ethnographic study of Low (1996) of two plazas in San Jose, Costa Rica: Parque Central, one of the oldest plaza in San Jose, and the contemporary Plaza de la Cultura. In her research Low focuses on the history, design and social life of the plaza by observing and documenting the behavior of people on the plazas for months on end and interviewing a variety of plaza users, combined with the consultation of historical documents. She shows how the plazas have different meanings for different groups and are therefore used differently by these groups. She interprets these observations with her framework of the social production and construction of space. In doing so she demonstrates the interaction between spatial design, practices and identity:

The architectural design and furnishing of these plazas are subject to symbolic interpretation and

manipulation by the users in such a way that the designs and material conditions of these two worlds become cultural representations to the users themselves”. (p. 876)

In my PhD research similar data will be gathered in four neighborhoods, two in the Netherlands and two in the United Kingdom. The British welfare sector is in comparison to the Dutch welfare sector more closely linked to housing, resulting in more attention being paid to

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physical interventions in urban renewal projects. Are these projects more successful than their Dutch counterparts? Are British city planners and policymakers more aware of the meaning of places and the construction of identities? By comparing urban renewal project in both countries I hope to demonstrate different mechanisms of influencing place attachments, resulting in

different effects on (place) identity and usage of neighborhood space. One of the case studies in the Netherlands will be on Emmen Revisited, a coalition of the city of Emmen, two regional housing associations and local residents, forged in 1997 to stop the exodus of families out of three post-war neighborhoods (Angelslo, Bargeres and Emmerhout). These neighborhoods were faced with high levels of nuisance, crime, unemployment and rising tensions between residents. The city government and the housing association Woomcom feared further deterioration and proposed and integral approach of town planning, public housing and social issues with all parties involved.

Emmen Revisited

Starting from the assumption that purely physical intervention would not be sufficient to solve these problems, the housing association reflected on her social role in the urban renewal of the three neighborhoods. Woomcom realized at the same time that they could not fulfill this role on their own. To tackle the combination of problems that persisted in the neighborhoods

cooperation was deemed necessary with a large number of local parties that could contribute with their own knowledge in a joint effort to regenerate the area. Since 1998 the housing association experimented together with the municipality, care and welfare organization, schools, police, residents and local businesses with new administrative forms and programs that combine physical, social and economic interventions.

However, working out integrated targets proved to be difficult in practice. The development of Emmen Revisited therefore can be seen as a journey to combine physical ‘restructuring’ with economic and social interventions. At first, attempts were made to involve residents in the making of development plans for the area. Together with local parties so-called district developments plans were drawn up, which presented an overview of the present situation in each neighborhood in terms of environmental quality, amenities and social structure. Based on the premises that no actions would be taken to address any of the inventoried problems a future image of each neighborhood was extrapolated from these descriptions. These doom scenarios allowed that parties involved to set goals for the future, which were translated into clear choices and specific actions, subdivided into five themes that corresponded to the experiences of

residents: Image, Living, Use of Space, Cooperation and Connections. Actions and choices were documented in so-called ‘starting documents’, which were discussed with local parties in each neighborhood. From these consultations districts-platforms were established: twice a year 20 to 25 local organization come together to discuss the feasibility and desirability of the proposed

measures in each district the and readjust the plans accordingly. This resulted in a detailed master plan for the development of each neighborhood.

Gradually the attention shifted from resident participation to organizing contacts between residents (meeting). The national program ‘Heel de Buurt’ (Neighborhood as a Whole)4

provided an opportunity to expand the social component of the integral approach. Resident participation no longer meant only the voicing of residents’ opinion, but stimulated emphatically the informal contacts between residents and their involvement with the neighborhood, for instance, by organizing sport activities and games in the neighborhood. A specially designed bus was provided to give young people a meeting point, where they could borrow equipment and materials for the activities. Some ‘meeting’ activities were linked with physical interventions, like the ‘porch conversations’ in high-rise apartment flats. After the renovation of the apartments was completed the inhabitants of apartments that shared the same entry (porch) discussed communal rules for their building. Where residents came to an agreement on the rules for their building this was symbolized by a plate above the front door. As a result of the renovations the coalition members of Emmen Revisited tried to influence explicitly the way residents lived together in their apartment block.

The projects that housing association Wooncom initiated within the coalition of Emmen Revisited demonstrate awareness that physical interventions have important social consequences for residents of renewed neighborhoods. Rebuilding a neighborhoods means also rebuilding the social network of residents are more often the destruction of this network, especially for long-term residents with a strong attachment to the neighborhood. Aware of this uprooting Emmen Revisited organized a Day of Memories when 300 flats were about to be demolished in

Emmerhout. Prior to the demolition residents who lived and had lived in the apartments were invited to write their memories on the walls of the apartments. At the same time a specially made film with interviews of former residents was shown to tell the history of buildings and aid residents in their trips down memory lane. Immediately after the Day of Memories a Demolition Party was organized. Residents could view the memories on the wall with the motto “If the walls could speak … ” and a specially composed Demolition Song was performed by children from a local school, while the first demolition activity took place: the demolishing of a window frame. While this happened balloons went up in the air with messages attached by the children. At the end of the ceremony residents were invited to join the Demolition Lunch in the community center, where the tables were decorated with freshly demolished parts of the apartments, like building rubble and toilet pots.

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National development project Community Based Approach (wijkgericht werken) commissioned by the Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sport, department of Social Policy and conducted in 10 Dutch neighborhoods (pilots) from 1998 until 2001.

This effort demonstrates important ways in which place identity and sense of place can be utilized in aiding inhabitants to make a less uprooting transition to new place of residence. Addressing the attachment people feel to the place they have lived in for so long when this place is about to be demolished, recognizes the symbolic value of the built environment. The housing association and other local parties can utilize this value, not only to easy the pain of moving and social uprooting for residents, but also to aid resident in their attachment to a new environment. Why not organize something similar for resident that return to their renewed neighborhood? This data is gathered in earlier research. For my PhD research additional data will be collected on place identity and sense of place to clarify the link with place attachment. This data is not yet available.

Quantitative data

In the remainder of this paper I will focus on a different type of data. A popular method of collecting data on place attachment is using surveys data on residents’ satisfaction. This data is readily available for a wide range of cities in the Netherlands and the United Kingdom5_.

However, community satisfaction is not the same as place attachment. While surveys on community satisfaction evaluate the places where people live, place attachment focuses on the emotional investments of people in places. Where surveys on community satisfaction ask residents to assess the physical and social quality of their environment, research on place

attachment queries residents about their feelings about moving from the community and whether they feel ‘at home’ in an area. According to Hummon (1993) Local satisfaction and attachment are relatively distinct dimensions of community sentiment and are only modestly related: some individual may be quite satisfied with their community without developing deeper emotional ties to the locale; others may express feelings of attachment to places they find less than satisfactory. Research on community attachment shows that the environmental quality of the local

neighborhood as objectively measured has little impact, though residents’ perceptions of the physical quality of the neighborhood are associated with attachment. Among objective features of the environment, only housing quality and ownership consistently seem to increase attachment to some degree. Rather community attachment seems to be most strongly associated with social integration into the local area. Local social involvements, particularly those with friends, but also those involving kin, organizational memberships, and local shopping, prove to be most

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For instance, the Dutch ‘WoonBehoefte Onderzoek‘ (WBO) coordinated by the Ministry of Spatial Planning, Housing, and the Environment. Since 1964 this research is conducted every four years and collects data from all major cities in the Netherlands on the compositions of households, their housing situation, housing demands, and relocation, making it one of the largest random sample surveys in the Netherlands. This data provides indicators on the physical and social perception of the residential environment and residents’ satisfaction with their community.

consistent and significant sources of sentimental ties to local places (Gerson et al., 1977; Guest & Lee, 1983).

These results illustrate that for place attachment to develop more is needed than just a ‘public familiarity’ with one’s neighbors. Talja Blokland uses the concept of public familiarity to emphasis the need for knowledge about neighbors instead of knowledge acquired in personal contact with neighborhoods to develop social trust in neighborhoods. According to Blokland the neighborhood is not basis for a shared identification, bur merely a framework that can be used for identification. Repeated observations of people in the public space of the neighborhood are sufficient to anticipate whether we can trust a neighbor or not. This knowledge does no need to be acquired in close personal contacts with neighbors. Her concept is consistent with the warnings of some scholars (Anderiessen & Reijndorp, 1989; Wellman, 1996; Friedrichs, 1997) against putting too much emphasis and fate on the neighborhood as a basis for identification and integration. They distance themselves from policy makers and landscape architects who paint a romantic picture of the harmonious community of the past, where life was well-organized and everybody knew and helped each other. They dismiss this line of thinking not only as a relic from the past but also as a ‘mythical netherworld’ that never existed.

Zegt iemand dus vroeger veel contact te hebben in de buurt en nu weinig, dan vertelt ons dit vooral iets over de mate waarin mensen familiair met elkaar waren: ‘iedereen kende iedereen’, maar ‘kennen’ had dan wel vooral de betekenis van ‘kennis hebben over’, van ‘bekend’ zijn met elkaar, niet van persoonlijke netwerken van duurzame relaties van mensen die elkaar graag mogen (2005: 30).

According to Talja Blokland is it not some much a decline of social capital, caused by people that are not bowling together anymore or spent too much time in front of the television, that makes neighbors mistrust each other, but the lack of opportunities to observe each other’s behavior in the neighborhood.

De genoemde grovere maatschappelijke veranderingen [migratie, toegenomen sociale en geografische mobiliteit, technologische veranderingen en de ontzuiling] hebben elk het praktisch buurtgebruik, dat wil zeggen de hoeveelheid activiteiten van het dagelijks leven die binnen de buurt plaatsvinden, verminderd en gedifferentieerd

(2005:30).

Therefore she argues for more public meeting places in the neighborhood, where people don’t have to interact, but can acquire public familiarity with one and other.

Although I agree the community (is and has never been) the all-encompassing framework for the organization of daily life and the identity of people, I argue that the

neighborhood is still an important framework for identification (albeit not the only one and not as important for everyone). Moreover, for identification to take place within the framework of the neighborhood more is needed that public familiarity. For place attachment to develop social interactions between people are required, in which meanings are exchanged and the environment

becomes ‘charged’ with meaning. Research on place attachment should therefore also focus on the social integration of people within the area they live in.

In measuring social contacts and integration in the local area scholars have encountered serious obstacles in mapping (and tapping) the social involvement of residents and the attitudes towards their community. Studies into neighborhood attachment and social cohesion of local

communities show low levels of agreement on the meaning (connotation), operationalization and empirical reference (denotation) of their concepts. Sjaeveland, Gärling and Maeland conclude in their review of neighborhood studies “that despite the considerable body of research, few studies on

neighboring have developed reliable and valid measuring instruments” (1996: 414). There appear to be two

distinct lines of research: one focusing on attitudes of residents regarding their involvement with their community (defined as sense of community) and the other measuring the social contacts and interactions between residents (defined as neighboring). In a review of the evidence on neighboring Gary Bridge, Ray Forrest and Emma Holland conclude:

Although sense of community and neighboring have been shown to be related closely, researchers usually have differentiated them as two different aspects of an individual’s relationship to his/her neighborhood and neighbors. Sense of community is a psychological variable referring to beliefs and attitudes about neighbors and the neighborhood. In contrast, neighboring is a behavioral variable involving social interaction and the exchange of support between neighbors (2004).

Because my concern in this paper is with the importance of social interaction for the

construction of identity and space I will focus on the latter the line of research that is concerned with neighboring. Aside from theoretical considerations, research on residents’ attitudes has methodological limitations and is criticized by Bridge et al. for its ambiguous meaning (e.g. using the classifications friend and neighbor interchangeably), the lack of attention to reciprocity (what my neighbor expects that I will do for him maybe quit different from what I expect him to do for me) and the faulty link with behavior (people often behavior different to what they say).

In the scientific literature different levels of neighboring are distinguished. The first form of contact between neighbors is usually superficial: a cursory nod of acknowledgement, making conversation, exchanging names, etc. The exchange of information is characteristic of this level of interaction. More intensive relations usually involve the exchanging of goods and services: borrowing tools, keeping an eye on each other’s children, exchanging keys, etc. At this level neighbors visit each other’s homes and spend time together in- and outside the neighborhood. Within this level of interaction a further distinction is made between practical support (accepting a parcel for your neighbor or feet their cat when they are on holiday) and emotional support (looking to neighbors in time of crisis). The latter type of support refers to the attitudinal line of research mentioned earlier. Other scholars refer to the distinction between manifest en latent support. Peter Mann (1954) for instance defines manifest neighborliness as social contact, visits,

greetings and small services, while he reserves the term of latent neighborliness for ‘sentiments unleashed in an emergency or event’. According to Man latent neighborliness is the most important factor in social cohesion: “Sleepy neighborhoods are the most secure. Too much manifest

neighboring may lead to resentment” (cited in Bridge et. al., 2004: 18).

Researchers are by no means in agreement on which dimensions to use and emphasis different levels in their research. Recently, new ways of measuring neighborhood-attachment and evaluations have been suggested (see for example Skjaeveland et al., 1996) that clearly show the multi-dimensionality of perceptions of neighboring and of evaluations of the physical dimensions of neighborhoods. Skjaeveland et al. (1996) argue that multidimensional approaches are more likely to discern the qualitative differences between neighborhoods and enable the analysis of several specific neighboring activities or experiences simultaneously. “A multidimensional measure

also makes it possible to assess potential interrelationships between these processes, thus increasing the understanding of the dynamics of neighborhood social life “ (415). To define neighborly activity,

Skjaeveland et al. (1996) produced 14 key neighboring questions. Their research aimed to develop a short, easily administered questionnaire that is useful for both policy oriented and academic research. Their paper reports on a survey designed to test and refine this research instrument. From the original 14 questions Skjaeveland et al. produce four dimensions all of which, they argue, have good discriminatory power between groups assumed to display certain neighboring behavior, for example families with children under 15, elderly people and long standing residents. The dimensions are: supportive acts of neighboring; neighborhood annoyance; neighborhood attachment and weak social ties. I would like the to stress the second dimension, which, as Skjaeveland remarks, is often overlooked in research: “Negative factors (annoyance) are often ignored in

neighbourhood studies and are more associated with, and dependent upon, close physical proximity” (416).

Moreover, what is still lacking is an evaluation of the contact residents maintain in and outside their neighborhood. Within social capital literature there is a strong bias towards the Putnam-model, which assumes that all types of social interaction are positive and thus focuses too much on ideas of community-development with concepts such as empowerment, participation, co-operation, mutual aid and support. This has blinded policy-makers for the possibility that citizens might also seek anonymity, tranquility and privacy rather than neighborhood contacts and that certain encounters with neighbors can also be negative. In a forthcoming publication I will address this issue, together with Nanne Boonstra, Jan Willem Duyvendak, Andre Krouwel, Lex Veldboer, resulting in a new tool for neighborhood attachment that is based on joint work.

Concluding remarks

I started this paper by stating that the present debate on the subject is lacking conceptual clarity, thereby reducing the focus of city planners, landscape architect and social professionals to a debate on the control of process variables: how can social programs be adjusted to the design and planning? What is lacking is a debate of the social and spatial effects of combined

interventions. To understand why some combinations are/ might be more successful than others I argued that a deeper understanding is necessary of the mechanisms behind these combinations. What are the dynamics between social interaction and the spaces in which these interactions take place? How do social interactions shape the usage of space and visa versa?

In this paper I have tried to specify the relationship between humans and their environment by using the concepts of place attachment and identity dynamics. I defined this relationship as mutually constitutive: places are not just a stage for social action, battle scenes for power and status, but are linked to people by an affective bond in which space is transformed into place by the meaning people attached to this space. Places are involved in the construction of personal and social identities with is displayed in their attachment to place and can be analyzed as place identity. Place is socially constructed. However, this does not imply that places are purely mental constructs that exist only in people mind. Places have a physical component, which cannot be ignored. With the concept of identity dynamics I have tried to explain how places are ‘imbued with meaning’: they become symbolic and ideological map references for the

communities that people belong to. Place are more than social constructions, they are material markers for the personal and group identities that people construct in their daily interactions. They are not merely setting but play an active role in the construction of identity. As symbols they can have different meanings for different people and are constantly confirmed and reconstructed. I define identity dynamics with four notions: constructivist, multi-locality, dynamic, and context/space bound. Places are socially constructed, have different meaning for different people at different times, in which material objects and rituals not only act as mediums but as active sources for expressing and maintaining personal and group identities. This process lends itself to be studied best with quantitative data, which allow rich descriptions of the exchange of meaning between people at different places in time. I discussed the example of a Day of Memories organized by Emmen Revisited, a coalition of the city of Emmen, two regional housing associations and local residents, prior to the demolition of 300 high-rise flat apartments. The coalition used place identity and sense of place to help inhabitants make a less uprooting transition to new place of residence. However, this type of research is time consuming and usually limited to small-scale studies, making it difficult to compare data between neighborhoods

and drawing more general conclusions about the relationship between social interactions and spaces.

Other research focuses on the use of places to forge a sense of attachment or home. Here, the preferred choice by researchers is attitudinal (quantitative) survey data on residents’ feelings about moving from the community and whether they feel ‘at home’ in an area. Although more readily available and easier to compare between different locations this type of data has its own limitations: some of the items used have ambiguous meaning, reciprocity is difficult to incorporate and attitudes are not consistent with displayed behavior. Therefore the most insight will be gained into the relationship between social interaction and usage of spaces when both types of data are combined. Comparing attitudinal data on sense of attachment between different urban renewal projects provides general indicators for the mediating effect of place attachment on the consequences of neighborhood renewal for the social and physical quality of the area. For a deeper understanding of these mechanisms qualitative data on the construction of place identity during the renewal process is necessary. The quantitative attitudinal data on different

neighborhoods can help to select relevant case studies for qualitative research into the different mechanisms of place attachment.

To understand how places are socially constructed, taking into account the role of material objects and rituals in the construction of identities, information is required on the social interactions of neighbors. Research on community attachment shows that place attachment is strongly associated with social integration into the local area. For identification to take place within the framework of the neighborhood it is not sufficient to know about your neighbors (public familiarity). For place attachment to develop social interactions between people are required, in which meanings are exchanged and the environment becomes ‘charged’ with meaning. However, studies into social cohesion of local communities are far from agreement on the meaning (connotation), operationalization and empirical reference (denotation) of social cohesion. The most promising development seems to be a multidimensional measurement, allowing not only the analysis of the amount and quality of social cohesion among resident, but also of the extent to which inhabitants actually need social contacts with neighborhood residents. Policymakers and social professionals often assume that social contacts are a positive source for neighborhood renewal where more is always better, while empirical evidence for this assumption so far is lacking. This is another important goal of my PhD-research. Aside from analyzing the relationship between people and places, my PhD research, for which this paper is a first attempt to identify key issues for further research, aims at developing more effective combinations of social and physical interventions for neighborhood renewal. I strongly believe that the

construction of identity and space are two of kind: perception influences behavior. People attach meaning to places in the process of producing and reproducing their identities. This process can in turn be influenced by the design of places and the way the design is realized: the characteristics

of places can be used in the (re) construction of identity and influence the usage of space. Therefore residents will benefit most from professionals that are aware of this mutually

constitutive relationship and are explicitly trying to influence this relationship. This requires new knowledge and tools, to which my research hopes to make a modest contribution.

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