Unsustainable inequalities: social justice and the environment

Abstract

UK highlights the extent to which tenants can, in fact, exercise choice and agency within the rehousing process. As Watt concedes, this contests the unremittingly coercive regeneration portrayal embodied by the state-led gentrification discourse. Moreover, drawing on his own rich body of evidence, Watt substantially complements existing knowledge on this aspect of the estate regeneration debate, as embodied in the diverse perspectives of London estate residents recounted in Chapter 10. Beyond this, it is argued that a singular focus on forced displacement due to estate demolition foregrounds “what leaving estates means to residents” but in doing so “underplays the sociological, spatial and housing complexities of living at estates” (p. 8). This observation seems highly relevant in an era when large and complex estate renewal projects are often scheduled to extend over decades – a timescale necessitated under the mixed tenure renewal model, where the associated market drip-feeding logic of participating for-sale housing developers prioritizes resulting price (and profit) maximization. Contrasting with the official regeneration discourse of “creating better places and lives,” Chapter 9 presents graphic evidence suggesting that project implementation is generally experienced by residents as “physical, social, symbolic and psychosocial degeneration” (p. 263). It is left somewhat unclear whether such an outcome is inevitable, or whether it reflects deficient – and possibly improvable – project management practice. Specifically, this downbeat assessment seems to defy the claims of some regeneration practitioners that there is potential for long-running redevelopment of large estates to be implemented via a modularized approach that minimizes exposure to disruption at any one time. Justifiably, Watt stakes a claim for his book as the first to provide “a theoretically informed, empirically rich account of the development and consequences of estate regeneration in London” (p. 13). However, while many aspects of the story are admittedly specific to the urban history, politics and governance of the UK capital, the book’s appeal should far transcend a Londonor UK-focused readership. Many of its observations and findings will resonate for scholars of social housing in pressured urban property markets, the world over, making it a valuable resource for postgraduate students of social geography and urban planning across many countries.