The Conditional Nature of Relations Between Competitiveness, Social Cohesion and Spatial Inequalities: The Evidence from Istanbul

Abstract

How do the attempts for reaching global competitiveness affect the social and spatial changes in city regions? Is it possible to reconcile competitiveness with cohesion, or will it increase the social and spatial disparities? The above two questions have been important to understand the changing structures of city regions and there appear different views on the conceptual relations between competitiveness and social cohesion. Most of the theoretical and empirical studies emphasize the deterioration of social cohesion and spatialisation of inequalities. The common assumption of the debates is that increasing cohesion will result in economic success as well. This chapter claims that the numbers of studies that go beyond these types of overgeneralisation and instead give the details of connections between policies and practice for competitiveness and social change are still limited. The chapter has a number of aims. Firstly, it aims to discuss the consequences of increasing competitiveness (as a result of the endogenous dynamics as well as several policies and projects) on the “socio-spatial cohesion”. Secondly, the chapter contributes to the existing debate findings of the empirical studies on the three main metropolitan regions of Turkey. The findings are the outcome of the detailed analysis on the spatialisation of socio-economic (in)equalities in city regions, with the help of data various sets of data on neighbourhood level.