Who is at "fault" for the gentrification of Brixton?

[Domski]

OK - I appreciate that there's a real danger of this degenerating into a mudslinging match but despite all the discussion of gentrification there's a lot of prevaricating around the actual cause and a lot of finger pointing at what gentrification actually produces rather than getting down to the root cause of why it's actually happening. Inevitably some of this ground will have been covered in other threads - so sorry...

I tend to think it's a product of the prevailing economic system rather than some sort of underhand plan to drive the incumbent community out of Brixton. But that's my opinion.

So who's fault is it?

1. The government
2. Lambeth council
3. Bar owners
4. The 'gentrifiers' - i.e. new people
5. The existing community (even)

etc etc...

Please lets not let this get into a discussion about 'editorial lines', the make-up of the Brixton forum, who doesn't get on with who etc...

 

[T & P]

It's certainly not numbers 4 or 5.

I think the issue is very complex and to be honest, even inevitable to a degree.

 

[newbie]

1 London transport building a tube station in 197something

2 Ken Livingstone/GLC for the first come first served giveaway of hard to let flats in about 1986, which boosted the process of repopulation.

3 the local community for striving against the odds to make this a reasonable, and even desirable, place to live.

4 Gordon Brown for sustained economic growth which tilts heavily towards the southeast and has brought a lot of people into London, and also ensured that property prices have risen substantially.

3 Urban75.net/vbulletin for increasing that desirability by making the local community appear more attractive than, say, Camberwell or New Cross which don't have such thriving forums.

 

[Blagsta]

Isn't it an inevitable result of market forces and capitalism?

 

[hendo]

Isn't it an inevitable result of market forces and capitalism?

I've sat at Anna Keys' dialectic knee for months now, and that's the lesson I've learned.

 

[Streathamite]

Isn't it an inevitable result of market forces and capitalism?

err, yeah, that's how I'd put it...
but you can put property companies, and Lambeth Council in the frame too

 

[Ol Nick]

I've sat at Anna Keys' dialectic knee for months now, and that's the lesson I've learned.

I think the important part of what we've learnt from AK is how other forces can be brought to bear to shape the influx of investment into Brixton so that inclusive rather than exclusive development is the result. Thus we see regeneration as opposed to gentrification.

(I reply on his behalf as he is probably too busy to reply himself.)

Edited to add:

 

[hendo]

I think the important part of what we've learnt from AK is how other forces can be brought to bear to shape the influx of investment into Brixton so that inclusive rather than exclusive development is the result. Thus we see regeneration as opposed to gentrification.

That's true.

 

[Domski]

Isn't it an inevitable result of market forces and capitalism?

Well that's the thing isn't it

It's always seemed to me to be a product of a wider issue rather than anything even remotely Brixton specific. I understand why there is unhappiness about the gentrification of Brixton but when there's a certain inevitability to it, complaining ad nauseam is almost virtually pointless as opposed to trying to DO something about it... in short, the only ways I can see the processes of gentrification slowing or being reversed in Brixton are through:

1. Campaign's like AK's re: Clifton Mansions
2. Wholesale rioting

I know which I'd rather have....

 

[Anna Key]

So who's fault is it?

1. The government
2. Lambeth council
3. Bar owners
4. The 'gentrifiers' - i.e. new people
5. The existing community (even)

etc etc...

I'd add "racists" to your list.

I agree with the argument – which drives some people mad and makes yuppies splutter into their live goats milk yoghurt – that the word “gentrification” in the context of Brixton is a synonym for the word “racist.”

In other words, those who gentrify Brixton are racists.

The argument is contained in a recent report to Lambeth Council concerning the possible sale of a central Brixton council estate. Here’s the relevant section of the report. The whole report is here. It's been discussed on this forum before.

6.1 Should the estate be cleared and sold for private sector housing this could have a significant cultural impact on central Brixton.

6.2 The black and ethnic minority middle-class in Britain is underdeveloped compared to the white middle-class with the consequence that a 'gentrified' former social housing estate in Rushcroft Road and Clifton Mansions is likely to be occupied mainly by wealthy white people.

6.3 The estate is in a strategic position at the heart of Brixton, a few yards from Lambeth Town Hall. At present it is home to a diverse ethnic and cultural residential mix.

6.4 Should the estate be sold and the community destroyed the Council risks establishing a private estate reserved predominantly for wealthy white owner-occupiers situated at the core of Brixton. Clifton Mansions, with its entrance gates on Coldharbour Lane, could become a gated security estate for white middle-class Londoners.

6.5 Apt seeks both to retain the estate as social housing and to agree with Lambeth Council a strengthened equal opportunities lettings policy to ensure that new tenancies offered on the estate to people from the housing register reflect fully Brixton's unique ethnic and cultural mix.

This argument, based on the relative sizes of the white and BME London middle classes, means that if you gentrify Brixton you drive out blacks in favour of whites.

If deploying market forces to drive out blacks in favour of whites isn't racist, what is? And it's happened before, in Notting Hill. So there's emprirical evidence to back up the argument.

And to do this at the very heart of Brixton - an icographically significant diverse neighbourhood with a history of resistance and political struggle - strikes me as somewhat provocative.

So gentrifiers, in the Brixton context, are racists.

They’re either “indirect racists,” who don’t realise the effect of their behaviour. Or they’re “direct racists” who indulge in gentrifying activity knowing full well they’re screwing black people in favour of whites.

 

[Mr BC]

Isn't it an inevitable result of market forces and capitalism?

I think this is the overwhelming reason.

I was interested to see from the last census that the population of inner London boroughs is now increasing for the first time since the 1890's. No one has really planned for this and it's causing all sorts of problems, particularly in housing and school provision.

That's not to say we hold up our hands and do nothing. Capitalism is not like the tide or the weather, it can be controlled. Government (both local and national) has a duty to control market forces/capitalism in the broader interests of affected communities. I think perhaps there is an argument that local councils should do more to ensure that existing communities are neither forced out nor destroyed by the economic forces we call 'gentrification'.

 

[Domski]

I'd add "racists" to your list.

I agree with the argument – which drives some people mad and makes yuppies splutter into their live goats milk yoghurt – that the word “gentrification” in the context of Brixton is a synonym for the word “racist.”

In other words, those who gentrify Brixton are racists.

The argument is contained in a recent report to Lambeth Council concerning the possible sale of a central Brixton council estate. Here’s the relevant section of the report. The whole report is here. It's been discussed on this forum before.



This argument, based on the relative sizes of the white and BME London middle classes, means that if you gentrify Brixton you drive out blacks in favour of whites.

If deploying market forces to drive out blacks in favour of whites isn't racist, what is? And it's happened before, in Notting Hill. So there's emprirical evidence to back up the argument.

And to do this at the very heart of Brixton - an icographically significant diverse neighbourhood with a history of resistance and political struggle - strikes me as somewhat provocative.

So gentrifiers, in the Brixton context, are racists.

They’re either “indirect racists,” who don’t realise the effect of their behaviour. Or they’re “direct racists” who indulge in gentrifying activity knowing full well they’re screwing black people in favour of whites.

I'm sorry Anna, but that's taking 'interpretation' to extremes and is complete nonsense - to be a racist because you are one of the 'gentrifiers' would directly mean that you are moving to an area because you deliberately want to displace BME communities... I didn't move to Brixton to do this - I know no-one who has moved to Brixton to do this. The most ruthless property developer in the history of the world wouldn't even be buying up property in Brixton so that they could displace BME communities.

Interpretations like the one you've just made are more damaging to your own arguments than anything else because they are patently ridiculous.

 

[Anna Key]

I'm sorry Anna, but that's taking 'interpretation' to extremes and is complete nonsense - to be a racist because you are one of the 'gentrifiers' would directly mean that you are moving to an area because you deliberately want to displace BME communities... I didn't move to Brixton to do this - I know no-one who has moved to Brixton to do this. The most ruthless property developer in the history of the world wouldn't even be buying up property in Brixton so that they could displace BME communities.

Interpretations like the one you've just made are more damaging to your own arguments than anything else because they are patently ridiculous.

Not if you're an "indirect racist" who doesn't realise the racist result of their gentrifying activity.

What would you call the activity of displacing blacks in favour of whites? If it isn't racist what is it?

Progress?

 

[tom796]

yeah, agreed, domski. anna key - lucid post, makes sense and all, but not racist. the effect may be the 'removal' of black residents in favour of white, but the motivation has nothing to do with race and everything to do with money. maybe this is your 'indirect racist', but it's just not on to go shouting things like 'racist' at everyone you can. and as domski says, it doesn't help your argument at all. this is about economics, market forces, and so on. in short, money.

 

[hatboy]

Yeah it is all about money - meaning the poor, (including a disproportionate number of black people) get fucked-over.

There is some racism too you know - some white people are unnecessarily scared of some of the weed sellers, Jamaican cafes, reggae pubs etc. They are. Search my post on "Harmony" bar for an example.

 

[pooka]

Does that mean that my erstwhile neighbours, who sold their house of 40 years at a whopping profit, bought one of their kids a flat and retired back to Jamaica, were racists?

 

[Domski]

Not if you're an "indirect racist" who doesn't realise the racist result of their gentrifying activity.

What would you call the activity of displacing blacks in favour of whites? If it isn't racist what is it?

Progress?

Look Anna - I understand your interpretation but I really do think it's nonsense.

Should people who are moving to an area ask themselves as their first question:

"Will I be driving the existing ethnic community out of their homes?"

You know - I doubt there is a quarter of half a percent of people in this world who'd ask themselves that question...

I moved to Brixton based on some great experiences of the place and on what I could (barely) afford.

You know what - I also wanted to get away from the 'singularity' of what I perceived to be my own (fairly narrow) background and be somewhere a bit more diverse.

Let me ask you this question...

Do you think it's better that:

A white middle class person wants to get to know more about other cultures and ethnicities?

OR

Is it more important for the cultural status quo to stay in place and for cultures to stay well clear of each other?



Do you reckon that people who go on holidays/missions to third world countries to find out more about the world and other cultures shouldn't do it because it's an intrusion?

Honestly Anna - I think you're wide of the mark on this one.

 

[Anna Key]

yeah, agreed, domski. anna key - lucid post, makes sense and all, but not racist. the effect may be the 'removal' of black residents in favour of white, but the motivation has nothing to do with race and everything to do with money. maybe this is your 'indirect racist', but it's just not on to go shouting things like 'racist' at everyone you can. and as domski says, it doesn't help your argument at all. this is about economics, market forces, and so on. in short, money.

I disagree, and think you're being naive.

A number of forces in British society would love to tame or destroy the powerful iconography of Brixton; who'd like to see Brixton's wildly rich multi-culturalism and diversity - 192 languages spoken - replaced with bland middle-class white culture.

The BNP is just such a group. The haters of multi-culturalism would love to see Brixton screwed.

The great advantage of market-led gentrification is you don't need a counter-revolution; you don't need to send in the mob to burn people out. You simply deploy the property developers and the white yuppies follow.

After softening up the area with bars like Living and BBG of course.

I agree with Mr BC. Capitalism can be controlled. There's nothing inevitable about the destruction of Brixton.

 

[hatboy]

Does that mean that my erstwhile neighbours, who sold their house of 40 years at a whopping profit, bought one of their kids a flat and retired back to Jamaica, were racists?

Pooka - I've really got to go. I see your point. It's complex and I knew someone would say that. Been said before. But search Tarranau's posts about his parents and their story of property ownership in S London years ago. Plus, most poor people (whatever colour) never get to owning property anyway. You're lucky if you can hang on to your council flat.

 

[pooka]

Domski; Don't get too wound up about this. Anna lit on the 'gentrification is racist' argument sometime last autumn as further string to his Rushcroft bow, and is playing it for all it's worth. The irony is that Rushcroft Road is not currently noted as being exemplery in terms of equal ops.

 

[lang rabbie]

Anna

The BNP have minimal influence on the South London property market ...other than depressing property prices in Erith and Welling a few years ago. (Black housebuyers were understandably concerned for their families wellbeing. Concerned whites had no wish to move to an area whose whole population was being damned by association with the minority of local BNP supporters).

 

[Pickman's model]

fwiw, i feel that one factor affecting gentrification in brixton and other inner city areas is a fear of the working class, be it black, white or blue.

by gentrifying areas, and diluting any sense of shared community - or shared formative experiences - a rerun of the disturbances of 1981, 1985 and the more recent mini-riots in brixton are much reduced.

 

[Pickman's model]

Does that mean that my erstwhile neighbours, who sold their house of 40 years at a whopping profit, bought one of their kids a flat and retired back to Jamaica, were racists?

it means they've profited from market forces many people see as malign to brixton - don't see the racist bit.

 

[Domski]

it means they've profited from market forces many people see as malign to brixton - don't see the racist bit.

I'd say selling up and profitting from the sale of your property to the detriment of your ethnic community is equally as racist if you use Anna's interpretation.

 

[hendo]

Honestly Anna - I think you're wide of the mark on this one.

So do I.

Surely I can't be labelled as a racist for choosing the "wrong" place to live.

More racist, surely, to bar people from living somewhere on grounds of their ethnicity.

 

[Streathamite]

surely AK, the only reasonable definition of a racist is 'one who judges others according to their colour/ethnicity, and acts and speaks in accordance with that'.
And it's highly doubtful that the incomers to brixton have been motivated to move here by a desire to shaft the BME community.
The net effect may mean precisely that, but that ain't the same thing. This merely makes them pawns of Capitalism's wicked ways.

 

[El Jugador]

Who is at fault?

(pinkmonkey posting) -

The Victoria Line for being covenient for the West End.
The house prices for being reasonable.

Can you blame people for looking for good transport links and big, cheap houses?

 

[Brixton Hatter]

Thatcher.
.

 

[Mr BC]

Thatcher.
.

Have I missed something or didn't she stop being Prime Minister 13 and a half years ago?

 

[maldwyn]

Isn't it an inevitable result of market forces and capitalism?

I’ve watched it in Islington over the last 25 years. Most of my working class neighbours have taken the money and ran, a few pockets of resistance remain - mainly the shit bits of social housing that weren’t snapped-up under the right to buy scheme.