Abstract
This paper discusses the tangible effects of economic and cultural globalisation at the neighbourhood level in Budapest, Hungary. Rather than examining local/national economic and cultural traits, it considers the impacts of capital investments, architectural influences, immigrant groups and cultural changes in the residential space. The spatial distribution of these impacts in Budapest suggests that global processes not only steer neighbourhood development but that they do so differentially. That is, certain aspects of globalisation tend to appear in specific neighbourhoods, where they affect local development to different degrees. In Budapest, we find that a neighbourhood’s relative location, image and socio-economic characteristics are the factors that influence the outcome most. The analysis interprets the way globalisation affects local development from the perspective of critical realism, an approach combining various methodologies. To highlight the nature of the global-local interplay, the study is framed by a general model of neighbourhood transformation.
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Notes
Trianon Peace Treaty, 1920 – Hungary lost two-thirds of its territory with most minorities and more than three million Hungarians.
The construction of 1 m3 of a residential unit at the end of the 1990s cost twice as much as that of office or commercial space (Síklaky, 1999).
In the Ferencváros rehabilitation area there used to be an American developer as ‘early’ as 1996 constructing the so-called American House in American style and mainly for Americans.
The Hungarian companies producing building materials have all been privatised by German and Austrian capital. Their main product line consists of brick and the classic building materials. In spite of the fact that lots of Canadian and American companies attempted to bring in the technology of light-structure houses, most of them failed as the brick lobby was so resistant. In Hungary, even in the greenbelt area, there is almost no alternative, and brick-built homes prevail.
Demján is a prosperous businessman involved in estate development.
Between 1990 and 2000, over 200,000 immigrants received a residence permit for a longer or shorter period. Most of them only made a stop-over in the country and left for the EU soon (Time Series, CSO, 2003).
The real international labour flow is not attributed to these Westerners but to the masses of people staying in Hungary and mainly in the capital who come from e.g. Romania. At the beginning of the 1990s, thousands of ethnic Hungarians left Romania in search of a better life and obtained Hungarian citizenship. Among the Romanian immigrants, citizenship is not that popular. They either go further to the west or stay in Hungary temporarily, like guest workers. They do not form permanent communities in the city but tend to find rental units in the poorer parts of the Pest side. In spite of the fact that they are numerous, they remain invisible, not influencing the residential areas with their cultural impacts. They are mainly engaged in the construction industry and send most of their income back home.
Here we mean the members before the enlargement!
Since the quoted ratio was calculated, Budapest has become more expensive, even for foreigners.
The Chinese traders became substitutes for Polish traders, who before 1989 symbolised the market for cheap, medium-or low-quality but affordable products for people in the lower segments of the society of the late-socialist era. Due to their geographical proximity, Polish traders never formed a stable community in Budapest.
Other Oriental or African immigrants may not have reached a critical number, their culture may not be so much based on community values, or their economic activity may not be commerce. At any rate, they are not so much on the scene.
Officials often associate foreign traders – whoever they might be – with crime, prostitution etc. That is why they objected so strongly to hosting a Hungarian Chinatown in their districts. It derived from another problematic group: the prostitutes. The municipal government was going to designate a zone for prostitution, but none of the district governments was willing to accommodate this.
“The happily globalising Hungarian family wastes its first savings on going to Disneyland (at least to the one next to Paris). The parents are the prisoners of Scientology; their son and daughter, while sweating in a fitness club, are dreaming about becoming the host of a talk show or a cover girl. The grandfather curses the Iron Curtain, which prevented him for 40 years from splashing his honestly earned money away in the casinos of Baden. Now he is not satisfied with his own luck but rushes to aid those in need. To take revenge on the communists he has just asked to be admitted to the Rotary Club.” (Kovácss, 2002, p. 438; quote translated)
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Földi, Z., van Weesep, J. Impacts of globalisation at the neighbourhood level in Budapest. J Housing Built Environ 22, 33–50 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10901-006-9065-2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10901-006-9065-2