This study investigates how policymakers evaluate the success of inclusive city policies, which aim to reduce urban disparities and foster equal opportunities across social, economic, spatial, environmental, and political dimensions. Despite their widespread adoption, many initiatives fall short of bridging the gap between ambitious goals and tangible outcomes. For instance, the Safer Cities...
During the transformation and reconstruction of cities, the politics of sustainability has been adopted. Because of the focus on environmental and economic components of sustainability during urban interventions, problems of social inequalities, insufficiency, insecurity, social exclusion, and lack of social unity have been raised. Since the primary purpose of urban interventions is to improve...
The contribution revolves around the "Borderland Brussels" project (BCUS-VUB, 2020-2022) and further research-by-design explorations (Cosmopolis, 2023-2025) which examine urban borderlandsโspaces defined by political, physical, and symbolic bordersโthrough interdisciplinary research in urbanism, anthropology, and criminology. These borderlands, shaped by migration, exclusion, and tension, are...
As China continues to explore and implement the concept of the "15-Minute Community Life Circle," optimizing the equitable and inclusive distribution of resources has become a key issue in the regeneration and construction of community life circles. Studies found that, although the distribution of public service facilities in existing communities meets various indicators, there was a clear...
Sharing economic development achievements is crucial for urban inclusivity. As globalization progresses and the economy grows, urbanization has become a vital indicator for assessing the socio - economic development level of a region. As an inclusive urbanization model, in - situ urbanization centers on the interests and demands of the rural population, a disadvantaged group. It can reduce the...
Abstract
Planning has been the key transformative action during these times of highly increasing global crises such as climate change, loss of biodiversity, and socio-economic inequality. We should not have blind pursuit of economic benefits; instead, we have to consider environmental ones during construction. It is not advisable to obtain high benefits at the expense of the...
As of December 2023, 34,078 North Korean defectors had entered South Korea, with more than 1,000 arrivals annually until 2019. The South Korean government, under the "Act on the Protection and Settlement Support of North Korean Defectors," provides comprehensive settlement assistance, including education, employment support, medical care, and housing. However, approximately half of North...
In response to growing planetary crises and the COVID-19 pandemic, urban-to-rural migration has emerged as a significant demographic shift, challenging traditional planning approaches and spatial justice considerations. This spatial mobility is particularly visible in Turkey's rural areas, where improved infrastructure, remote working possibilities, and changing lifestyle preferences have...
Migration, as a search for the better, has to be considered as an important element of human survival process. More than ever, in an age of planetary crisis migration gained multiple meanings and importance. Resource depletion, wars and disasters, social and economic injustices, problems of security and quality of life can be mentioned as some of the major research areas.
As a reflection...
Refugee' livelihoods have recently attracted attention as they are increasingly caught up in and related to major global transitions in climatic, economic and social systems. In particular, human-made disasters and mass migrations make it necessary to examine the livelihood vulnerability of refugees. The United Nationโs 2030 Sustainable Development Goals adopt a livelihoods approach to...
Since migration is an urban reality, many cities are unavoidably associated with the politics of multiculturalism. However, multiculturalism refers to a variety of incomplete and everchanging political strategies and processes in different countries, calling for a rethinking of the social and spatial integration of immigrants and new ways to live together for urban planners and designers. In...
The study was carried out in order to reveal how migration is discussed in the urban design literature and in which contexts it is addressed. Migration is a concept that significantly affects space and social life in today's cities. This population movement, which started to increase in the second half of the last century, has accelerated even more in this century and has become observed on a...
This research explores how gender equality shapes economic growth in Europe by focusing on the Gender Equality Index (GEI) as a key measure. Using the E3ME econometric model, it examines how reducing the gender pay gap, encouraging womenโs participation in STEM fields (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics), and promoting equal job opportunities contribute to GDP (Gross Domestic...
The concept of โequalization of basic public servicesโ has gained increasing attention in China, alongside the public's growing aspirations for a better life. However, significant challenges remain in addressing imbalances and inadequacies in public service, particularly in terms of regional, urban-rural, and demographic disparities(Xu et al., 2022). Aligning public service distribution with...
Education is critical for understanding urban and social inequalities in Turkey. The Turkish Statistical Institute's annual report on education expenditure and poverty highlights a significant disparity: individuals in the highest income bracket spend nearly ten times more on education than those in the lowest. The statistics reveal a striking correlation between education and poverty rates;...
Over the last twenty years, inequalities within cities have started to grab increasing attention among scientists and policymakers (Nijman and Wei, 2020). In fact, evidence suggests that cities across the world are again witnessing growing socio-spatial disparities due to new driving forces for urban development, often deriving from uncontrolled global processes (OECD, 2018). The reason of...
Urban residential segregation is a widely studied concept, broadly defined as the spatial separation of social and economic groups within cities. This phenomenon stems from historical, economic, political, and cultural factors, varying in form across different regions (Dadashpoor & Keshavarzi, 2024). Generally, it manifests in two ways: the concentration of affluent residents in gated...
Muslim women refugees, particularly those from conflict-affected regions such as Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq, and Somalia, face unique and intersecting barriers related to gender, religion, ethnicity, and refugee status. These challenges significantly impact their spatial integration in host cities, shaping their perceptions of belonging and access to resources within urban environments. The...
One of the alarming aspects of the global cities is that social and economic disparities and inequalities are deepened and they accompany with the flourishing informal sector. These inequalities have significant impacts on urban space. One of these places, known as Kรผรงรผkpazar, is located at the outskirts of the Sรผleymaniye World Heritage Site in Istanbul. The market area is a small square and...
According to feminist theorists (Federici, 2017, 2019; Hollanda, 2018; Kern, 2019; Lugones, 2020) and scholars from urban disciplines (Colยทlectiu Punt 6, 2019; Falรบ, 2020; Hayden, 1980; Horelli, 2017; Horelli and Damyanovic, 2019; Huning et al., 2019; Tavares, 2015), the structure and design of our cities exclude women due to highly unequal societal and non-representative power structures, as...
Migration flows are becoming increasingly polarized in many cities worldwide, widening the gap between vulnerable and privileged migrants and, more broadly, sharpening class differences in our cities. This division is particularly evident in highly attractive and economically competitive cities like Zurich, where the polarization of the migration configuration is becoming evident in the social...
Indian cities are transitioning towards more modernist, techno-managerial, and capital-intensive approaches to understanding and managing urban ecologies under national flagship programs such as the โClean India Mission-Urbanโ and the โSmart Cities Mission.โ While these transitions are deemed normative pathways for achieving โsustainable developmentโ and addressing the โpolycrisisโ cities are...
Climate change risks affect various aspects of urban life - social, cultural, spatial, or their intersections. How the built environment is conceived and designed affects how people live, work, and recreate and, at the same time, how people respond to risks. Such risks, like urban heat island effects (UHIs), flooding, etc., threaten urban community resilience and increase vulnerability...
Although alienation represents the "arche" of Marxist theory, it has also been an important topic of discussion in terms of urbanism. Parallel to the alienation of man from his labour, his own life and man from man, the aggressive policies of production relations in cities trigger the alienation and exclusion of man from the city. This research examines the levels and types of alienation...
Although the right to housing has been part of the Spanish Constitution since 1976, over 1 million families have been evicted from their homes since Spain's property market crashed in 2008. Face of the housing emergency and the political inaction, in 2009 a social movement emerge, The Platform of People Affected by Mortgages (PAH) and in 2017 the tenants' union, both with the aim to stop the...
This research seeks to develop an understanding of Baghdad's understudied role in processes of collective identity building and how different visions of citizenship have changed the face of the city. Since the establishment of the Iraqi state in 1921, the capital has been central to questions of belonging and social stability in the country. The richness of Baghdad's ethnic and sectarian...
Despite decades of debate, policies, efforts and funding dedicated to territorial cohesion within the EU, the quest for โdevelopmentโ in long-term lagging regions is still an ongoing and largely open dilemma; a dilemma that has become even more dramatic due to the changing socio-ecological dynamics as well as the neoliberal evolution of society, economics, and politics.
This paper...
Urban spatial interventions of central and local governments in Tรผrkiyeโs cities in the form of master plans, plan amendments and piecemeal profit-driven initiatives have increasingly become subject to lawsuits in the past few decades. The two institutional actors that are at the center of this process are the Chambers of City Planners and the Chambers of Architects, which are the leading...
Comparative research is a social science methodology that entails comparing two or more cases, phenomena, or entities to discern their similarities, differences, and patterns. Comparative research is important for advancing the knowledge for urban sustainability transformations by highlighting diverse practices, policies and challenges for achieving transformations. However, comparative...
Right-wing politics are on the rise globally, with politicians increasingly promoting nativism and anti-immigrant rhetoric combined with neoliberal policies. While many theorists might expect marginalized urban populations to turn to leftist politics to improve their living conditions, these groups often align with right-wing movements. Rather than dismissing such choices as misguided, our...
In dialog with recent research on urban planning, race and ethnicity (e.g. Mele 2017; Beebeejaun 2022; Williams 2024), in this paper I examine the planning of camps for socially disadvantaged, Eastern European Roma by the municipality of Rome from 1993 to 2020. Drawing on extensive archival, policy and interview-based research, I trace the intersections of political economy and planning...
This paper examines the current challenges in the spatial dimensions of our city's social construction efforts, including the low level of resource allocation efficiency, inadequate expression of urban characteristics, and shortcomings in management systems. It offers reflections on the issues and underlying causes affecting social construction in our city. Drawing on successful practices in...
Participation in decision-making processes is a longstanding issue in both research and practice. It is widely claimed that planning can become socially equitable and more democratic by incorporating stakeholdersโ perspectives and altering the power dynamics within urban governance. However, further research is necessary to assess the degree of influence that participation grants to...
Rapid urbanization has transformed cities into vibrant yet unequal spaces, often escalating socio-spatial inequalities through commercialization, marginalization, and gentrification (Raymond et al., 2021). Marginalized communities tend to seek refuge in informal settlements like slums, squatter settlements, and urban villages, wherein exclusion manifests spatially (McCartney and Krishnamurthy,...
The impacts of climate change, including sea level rise and tidal flooding, significantly affect communities. These include changes in livelihoods, migration due to environmental changes, household finances, health, and education. Climate change poses major challenges for communities, particularly women and vulnerable groups. These groups often face barriers and issues related to gender...
This paper proposes and discusses a novel concept of vulnerability and its implications for transformative urban policies and practices. As well known, vulnerability has gained a prominent role in several discourses concerning urban social and environmental justice. Within these discourses, vulnerability has become a sort of mental image which is used to represent conditions of exposure of...
This study utilizes the Korea Labor Panel to explore how neighborhood characteristics moderate intergenerational mobility of income and assets in South Korea. We employ moderation analysis using MPLUS to examine the interaction between parental socioeconomic status and neighborhood factors, such as average income, wealth distribution, and housing stability. The findings indicate that...
Entrepreneurial activities are embedded in space (Reuschke et al., 2015; Welter, 2011; Wright & Stigliani, 2013), and for women in particular, these activities are often deeply intertwined with local communities, networks and available spatial resources at the neighborhood level (Ekinsmyth, 2011; Hanson, 2003, 2009). Space embeddedness is crucial for womenโs personal and professional support...
In the current era of rapid migration, it is stated that one out of 30 people is on the move, and the proportion of the population living in cities will increase to 66% in 2050 (IOM, 2024). Migration corridors have started to take shape in the last 30 years due to neoliberal economic policies, war, displacement and climate crisis. Turkey is located between important migration corridors such as...
A recent study conducted by โSave the Childrenโ identifies the scarcity of childcare services and the inadequate quality of educational offerings as the main causes of educational poverty, emphasizing how this phenomenon is closely linked to the level of material poverty in which families live.
This issue is particularly evident in Palermo (Sicily, Italy), where disparities are especially...
The inclusion paradigm involves creating spaces where everyone feels comfortable, yet it raises a paradox: how can we achieve inclusivity in contexts where discomfortโstemming from extreme social and economic vulnerability in marginalized areasโdefines daily life? How truly inclusive is inclusion, and which inequalities remain unaddressed or even worsened? This paradox forces us to consider...
As climate change accelerates, its effects disproportionately impact vulnerable and historically marginalized populations, amplifying existing social and economic inequalities. Rural and coastal communities, Indigenous nations, and under-resourced regions often lack access to the scientific data, policy frameworks, and institutional support needed to navigate these challenges. The Institute...
The deinstitutionalisation movement has been implemented in mental healthcare since the 1950s. In the 1980s, Taiwan also introduced the idea of psychiatric rehabilitation, intending to shift the focus of mental healthcare from symptoms to restoring individuals' ability to live in the community. However, there are many difficulties in the deinstitutionalisation process. For instance, in 2019,...
Urban planning can affect respiratory health. Due to industrial and mining pollution, unique spatial structure, etc., the built environment factors of coal resource-based cities have special impact paths on respiratory health. Lung cancer is one of the cancers with the highest incidence and mortality rates worldwide. Qujing, located in the eastern part of Yunnan Province, China, is dominated...
Promoting healthy living environments necessarily passes through awareness that the determinants of health lie mainly outside the control of the public health sectors. Healthy living is the result of several factors that may produce health inequalities across socio-economic groups. As shown by WHO and other organizations, inequalities should be reduced for equity reasons and for sustainable...
In contemporary society, the growing demographic of older adults and rapid urbanization make rethinking the relationship between health and the urban environment crucial (WHO, 2017). Housing quality and organization of urban spaces significantly impact older adultsโ physical and mental health, shaping their aging trajectories (Oswald et al., 2011). This underscores the need for innovative,...
In Turkiye, cities typically pursue growth-oriented visions spurred by economic expansion and a focus on construction. Conversely, smaller cities facing difficulties in meeting these criteria experience setbacks like population decline and a decrease in quality of life stemming from economic contraction (Arslan et. al, 2016). To address these challenges, adopting new planning concepts creates...
With the continuous increase in the aging population, ensuring the mobility of older adults contributes significantly to their physical and mental well-being as well as their social participation. The built environments in neighborhoods with the concept of healthy aging are a critical area of focus of study. The older adults heavily rely on walking as their primary mode of neighborhood travel....
With the worsening of low fertility and ageing in China, the proportion of elderly people is gradually increasing, and the government is placing greater emphasis on addressing the social needs of the elderly. In the Shanghai metropolitan area, Shanghai is the first city in China to experience population ageing, with the highest degree. Some cities, such as Nantong, have also entered a severely...
Urban environments are seldom tailored to the needs of children and young people. Through car-centric development, childrenโs use of public spaces, opportunities for play, physical activity and social interaction became increasingly limited. This exclusion impacts their physical, socioemotional, and cognitive development. Child-friendly cities, as defined by UNICEF, prioritize childrenโs...
With the advancement of child-friendly urban planning initiatives, the quality of Active School Travel Spaces (ASTSs) has an important impact on childrenโs healthy growth. However, existing research on evaluating the quality of school travel spaces predominantly relies on subjective experience, and a systematic, large-scale quantitative measurement framework hasn't been established. As a...
The global trend of population aging is accelerating. The United Nations predicts that by 2050, individuals aged 60 and above will account for 22% of the global population. In China, as of 2018, the population aged 60 and above was approximately 178 million, the number of people with disabilities was about 85 million, and the low-income population reached around 282 million. These three groups...
The research investigates the accessibility of sanitation facilities in slum areas, specifically focusing on Kampung Muka in North Jakarta. The study is motivated by the recognition that adequate sanitation is a fundamental human right and essential for public health, as emphasized by the United Nations and the World Health Organization. Despite global attention to sanitation issues, a...
Accessibility is a fundamental right, yet urban spaces continue to impose legal, spatial, societal, and administrative barriers that restrict independent mobility, particularly for persons with reduced mobility (PRMs). While accessibility regulations in Turkey are well-defined, their practical implementation remains fragmented, leading to continued exclusion from urban life. This research...
Seeing autism as a natural variation of human beings, the emerging paradigm of neurodiversity seeks recognition of difference for its community. In its struggle for justice, the neurodiversity paradigm needs to rely on a theoretical spatial framework to assert its โright to the cityโ. The question that arises here is how urban planning theory, as the field concerned with the materiality of the...
The global population aging trend necessitates a deeper understanding of factors influencing older adults' physical and emotional well-being. Mental health disorders, particularly depression, are a critical concern in this vulnerable demographic group, per the WHO. While past studies indicate an association between participation in outdoor physical activity and improved mental health...
The intertwined crises of climate change and care work represent critical challenges of contemporary society, with pronounced gender dimensions impacting the causes, effects, and mitigation strategies. Within small and medium sizes towns the challenges are often overlooked. Much of the existing discourse focuses on urban contexts, leaving small and medium-sized towns, particularly in rural...
Rapid urbanization and the growth of mega-cities have resulted in numerous risks, concerns, and problems across various aspects of urban life, including environmental, social, and economic domains. Cities and regions are inevitably moving toward urban digitalisation owing to the fast-paced development of information and communication technologies (ICTs). The concept of 'smart city' represents...
Unjust practices have shaped the built environment, encompassing land dispossession, discriminatory land use planning and regulations (Goetz, et al, 2020), harmful material extraction (Malin et al., 2019), toxic production processes, and wasteful construction, consumption, and demolition practices (Grace Farms, 2023; Huuka, 2023). Current building practices and land development processes have...
The earthquakes that struck southeastern Turkey on February 6, 2023, caused widespread destruction and displaced hundreds of thousands of people to temporary shelters. This study examines the applicability of the design criteria developed for the UN Women Turkey Gender-Responsive Settlement Model (GRSM).
The research evaluates temporary shelter areas in earthquake-affected cities in...
Urban Vegetable Gardens (UVGs) have become an emerging urban landscape infilling the interstitial space of urban areas. Such informal self-motivated agricultural activities occupying vacant lands are primarily driven by elderly migrants. In the context of the Chinese ageing society, the expansion of UVGs shows a new pattern of fulfilling both the physical and mental needs of the elderly,...
In response to increasingly complex urban development challenges, reports from the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP, 2024) and Asian Development Bank (ADB, 2020) indicate that smart cities are one approach to addressing rapid urbanization. Through applying science and technology to improve the quality of life, it is considered to optimize the allocation of resources and overall...
This paper investigates the local impacts of just transition policies in Irelandโs Midlands, focusing on communities most affected by the closure of peat power plants. These regions face the dual challenge of transitioning to a low-carbon economy while addressing historical disinvestment and limited capacity to develop new green pathways (Tรถdtling & Trippl, 2018; Grillitsch & Hansen, 2019)....
The growing migration of Somali students to Tรผrkiye, facilitated by Tรผrkiye Scholarships and strengthened diplomatic ties, reflects a complex interplay between migration policies, cultural identity, and spatial practices. This study investigates the experiences of Somali students in Ankara, focusing on how Tรผrkiye's supportive policies influence their migration decisions and spatial...
During summer and autumn 2024 the Ville de Luxembourg, Luxembourg established a new process to update their decennial ((2004, 2014, 2024) local neighbourhood plans. Combining top-down dissemination of approved large-scale urban developments with residents via the concept of Apรฉriโtours, integrated bottom-up participatory activities included urban sketching, sound recordings and participatory...
Population growth and the related demand for housing have been fostering a significant urbanisation process since the end of the Second World War. Urbanisation is one of the megatrends of the 21st century (United Nations, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, 2018). Cities are conceived as the main centres of wealth, characterised by high concentrations of technology, capital and labour,...
Accessibility in cities plays a crucial role in social integration and quality of life (Grisรฉ et al., 2019; Kenyon et al., 2002; Silva et al., 2023). It determines opportunities for participation in daily life, particularly for vulnerable groups, and enhances urban resilience by ensuring reliable access to transport and services. The ability of cities to withstand crises and change is linked...
In modern Korean society, there is a growing issue of class conflict and social exclusion of certain groups, which leads to a decline in social capital and hinders social integration. In particular, residents of public housing experience discrimination due to social stigma and self-stigma. Self-stigma occurs when individuals internalize negative consequences associated with their socioeconomic...
The concept of social vulnerability has garnered increasing focus in recent decades, owing to its extensive range and interdisciplinary characteristics. A portion of these studies has been closely associated with the domain of urban planning and development. The notion of social vulnerability became integrated into the academic discourse of urban planning and disaster management during the...
According to the United Nations Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, the โRight to Adequate Housingโ means the provision of not just four walls and a roof, but rather the minimum requirement of legal security of tenure, availability of services, affordability, accessibility, habitability, location, and cultural adequacy. The requirement for a house is not limited to the...
The continuous growth of immigrants in the United States and their residential dispersion into different communities have given rise to various local responses to the immigrant population across policy domains. Local government and civil society leaders have already started to join efforts, share best practices, and form partnerships to effectively integrate immigrants (De Graauw and...
In the Global South, the outdoor spaces for children play have been severely restricted due to rapid urbanization and densification of urban areas. The increasing degree of urbanization has negative impacts on the independent mobility of children (Kytta 2004). With the lack of urban policies for children, the contemporary children's outdoor play spaces have been limited to private gardens,...
With the acceleration of Shanghai's urban development, the construction of five new cities has become the key for Shanghai to lead the development of regional integration, and population agglomeration has always been a difficult problem in the construction of new cities in Shanghai. This study focuses on this phenomenon and deeply analyzes the internal motivation of population growth,...
The novel concept of the 15-minute city has gained ground in the planning domain worldwide due to the numerous benefits proclaimed for local communities. Although it builds upon previous urban planning movements and ideas, new labelling at the right time has absorbed extra attention when cities globally face resource constraints, climate change, vulnerable settlements, pandemics, and social...
The evolution of global and regional migration policies offers critical insights into how Tรผrkiye has navigated its responses to migrant entrepreneurship. The EUโs migration strategy has been shaped by emerging labor shortages in Member States, driven by demographic shifts such as an aging population and declining workforce availability. These challenges underscored the economic necessity of...
The 2011 Syrian crisis displaced over 12 million people, making it one of the most significant forced migration events in recent history (UNHCR, 2023). Among the countries receiving displaced populations, Germany and Lebanon have recorded some of the highest refugee numbers worldwide. As of 2024, Germany hosts the largest refugee population in Europe, while Lebanon has the highest per capita...
Urban rights, as developed in the United Nations' New Urban Agenda (2016), prioritize the values of inclusivity, sustainability, and equitable access to urban resources. Cities not only function as spaces for governance and economy but also for social encounter and exercising one's rights. The agenda foresees urban spaces in which all citizens, regardless of their legal and economic status,...
For a long time, urban studies on migration have relied on binary distinctions such as formal/informal, local/outsider, โhostโ communities/โincomingโ migrants, inclusion/exclusion, norm/exception, and emergency/ordinariness. Among these, the polarized contrast between permanence and temporariness stands out: permanence is often regarded as the condition to aspire to, while temporariness is...
