Sustainable urban development & social equity
Gentrification
The transformation of a working-class or disinvested neighbourhood by an influx of wealthier residents and capital, typically displacing original residents and businesses.
Definition
Gentrification is a neighbourhood upgrading process marked by an influx of new capital investment and residents of higher socio-economic status into low-income and inner-city areas, ultimately displacing existing working-class residents and businesses through rising costs. The term was coined in 1964 by British sociologist Ruth Glass to describe the transformation of London working-class districts by incoming "gentry".
References
definition and origin
academic definition
Overview
What it means
Gentrification captures the double edge of urban reinvestment: renewed buildings, services, and tax base on one side; displacement, loss of affordable housing, and erasure of community on the other. In sustainability debates it is central to "green gentrification", where parks, transit, and climate-adaptation upgrades themselves raise values and push out the residents they were meant to benefit.
How it is used
Urban researchers, planners, and campaigners use the concept to assess regeneration projects, design anti-displacement policies (rent stabilization, community land trusts, right-to-return), and evaluate the equity of green infrastructure.
Why it matters
Sustainable cities that price out their existing communities fail the social pillar of sustainability; gentrification is the concept that names that failure.
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