9.3 Social & Economic Issues associated with urbanisation

• Economic Inequality - the unequal distribution of money against the population
• Social segregation - the separation of groups or people from a particular ethnic group which are concentrated in a certain area
• Cultural diversity - the existence of a variety of cultural or ethnic groups within a society
• Reasons for social segregation:

  Housing - developers, buidlers and planners tend to build housing on blocks of land with a particular market in mind

  Changing environments - houses built for large families in the Georgian times are now too big for an average family and have been converted into houses of multiple occupation by those on low incomes or students

  Ethnic dimensions - ethnic groups originally come to the country as immigrants. As they are unemployed they are only able afford cheap housing. Therefore, newly arrived migrants concentrated in low income areas in cities.
• Social segregation:

  Inner cities have often been the most deprived urban neighbpurhoods. This is caused by de-industrialisation when unemployment became a major issues.
• tackling poverty and inequalities:

  • enforcing a living wage, in shanghai they have a minimum wage of $358 per month which is the highest in china
  • provision of schools
  • supporting low skilled workers who want to develop their abilities
  • access to affordable housing
  • greater provision of public transport
• Cultural diversity

  • the existence of a variety of ethnic and cultural groups within a society
  • globalisation has increased movement around the world

  why is their greater cultural diversity in cities?

  • range of employment
  • first points of entry into a country by immigrants
  • cities tend to house earlier immigrant groups with the same ethnicity
  • urban populations tend to be tolerant of immigrants
• Reasons for ethnic segregation in cities:

  Self-segregation:

  • maintenance of culture, language & traditions
  • protection against racial abuse and attacks
  • provision of specialist facilities e.g places of worship
  • migrant seek support and security of living near friends and relatives

  External factors

  • migrants have been a source of cheap labour, forcing them into cheap housing
  • hostility from the majority of the population
  • white flight
  • less successful in securing mortgage loans