Gentrification: A Working-Class Perspective

This is a UK-focused sociological account of gentrification. Its theoretical foundation is hegemony and its practical component is ethnography. Paton was driven by the belief that the working class are the most likely to be targeted by gentrification, yet are insufficiently accounted for in gentrification debates. Coupled with this is a generally poor understanding of both the everyday experiences of gentrification and its role within wider restructuring processes.

Paton uses the definition of gentrification as “a process that creates space for the progressively more affluent user”. She sees this as part of a larger set of urban trends: the decline of industry, changes in land use, more entrepreneurial local governments, and increasingly neoliberal modes of consumption.

Paton argues that gentrification is a strategy to manage working-class people, not necessarily to displace them. The upheavals associated with gentrification make it difficult for those unsettled to develop a strong class identity. Some policymakers also believe that gentrification will “civilize” unmanageable inner-city areas – an idea that reveals the classist sentiment behind certain urban policies.

While the people profiled in Gentrification feel disassociated from class identity, they do feel an attachment to place. This flies in the face of expectations that only relatively affluent people experience “elective belonging”. The interviewees also tend to conflate place and class (which is mirrored in the expression “from the wrong side of the tracks”, in which race- and class-based judgements are embedded). This lends weight to the author’s overall argument for analysing place as a crucial aspect of class.

Paton’s research subjects contribute to and resist gentrification in varied ways, for instance in relation to new housing developments. The stories Paton gathers show that the working class are far from being a monolithic group, and that their relationships to place are highly complex.

Further reading:

Mills, C A (1988), “ ‘Life on the upslope’: the postmodern politics of gentrification”, Society and Space Vol 6, No 2, pages 169–189, available at http://www.envplan.com/abstract.cgi?id=d060169.

Book note prepared by Christine Ro