Gated communities have become common forms of housing development in cities around the world. They have been defined as “walled or fenced housing developments, to which public access is restricted, characterized by legal agreements which tie the residents to a common code of conduct and (usually) collective responsibility for management.” However, this definition doe not encompass the extremely heterogeneous forms that gated communities take.

The withdrawal of the generally affluent into gated enclaves opens up an array of issues: first, a loss of social diversity in the neighbourhoods that they have left, thus reinforcing tendencies to social segregation. Gated communities also represent a spatial withdrawal of elite groups that threatens traditional spatial contracts between neighbourhoods and cities, mediated by central and local states. In general, it has been well documented that these somewhat new forms of urbanism are natural responses to high rates of fear and crime, so people’s preferences for living in such communities might be directed primarily by a sense of fear and a need for security. However, to explain the existence of gated communities only through “structural” explanations might be too limited, since other possible motivations might be rooted in people’s choices for privacy, predictability and even social status.

The socio-spatial segregation is exacerbated by gated communities both in their inner and outer spaces, especially in societies where social and territorial inequalities are problematic. The displacement of crime away from increasingly hardened targets, inhabited by those who can afford access to privatized security, exports conflict and chaos towards those areas that present softer targets. The extent of urban public services in poorer areas may suffer as result of the opting out of municipal provision that is evident in many gated communities, which have their own privatized fiscal arrangements and revenues. More attention should be paid to the role of the state (at all scales) on the social and urban conditions that allow the proliferation of gated communities.

In relation to governance, since gated communities’ legal frameworks are forms of contracts around good internal behaviour, they are also a way of replacing blurred senses of neighbourhood community and state responsibility. Furthermore, the provision of property and contract regulations is used to facilitate a built form that appeals to both developers and residents. However, one party frequently enters this particular contract either because there is no alternative or, at least, ignorant of the real legal implications. Most of the gated communities analyzed in this book proved to be less voluntary community bonds and more enforced relationships with homeowner associations. Perhaps what best defined the contributions presented in this book is their heterogeneity: cases from Brazil, Taiwan, Argentina, Germany, China, Canada, the UK and the US offer empirical data on the effects of gated communities in different locations and political contexts.