The Post-Soviet Urban Poor and Where They Live: Khrushchev-Era Blocks, “Bad” Areas, and the Vertical Dimension in Luhansk, Ukraine

Abstract

Using a combination of descriptive and multivariate regression methods applied on a sample survey (n=4000) conducted in Luhansk (Ukraine) during Fall 2013, this paper investigates demographic, socio-economic, housing-specific and geographical factors that predict urban poverty in countries undergoing economic, political and institutional transition from state socialism to the market with a specific focus on Ukraine. By doing so, it contributes to the literature on poverty under and after transition, which has a strong position within economics, and to the literature on the spatial expressions of poverty after state socialism, which is particularly prominent within geography. Inspired by Amartya Sen's notion that poverty contains an irreducible absolute core, as well as a relative component, this paper makes use of a poverty index based on multiple thresholds that reflect the respondents' capabilities to meet different needs. A fascinating result of this exercise is that poverty under transition is not only predicted by such classical factors as sex, personal and parental education, and socio-occupational status, but also by housing-specific details such as location in vertical space and by classical geographical factors such as relative horizontal location and neighborhood prestige. Accordingly, this paper responds to recent calls for increased sensitivity towards the third dimension of space in contemporary urbanism, while at the same time making a substantial contribution to our hitherto incomplete knowledge of the patterns and sources of urban poverty and inequality in postsocialist transition.

Vertical segregation of apartment building dwellers during late state socialism in Bucharest, Romania

“…As showed by pseudo R 2 results, the models' explanatory power rises significantly from 0.011 to 0.052 and from 0.018 to 0.084 for older and newer buildings, respectively. However, even if the effect of age is omitted (models 3A and 4A), the ground floor and top floors seem to house lower social status residents (Table 4), which is consistent with previous findings (Bater, 2006;Gentile, 2015). Essentially, there is no difference in the educational attainment between those living on the ground floor and the top floors.…”

“…Moreover, while ground floor apartments usually house the lowest social groups, irrespective of political systems, the poor quality of prefabricated housing (especially leaking roofs and faulty elevators) discouraged higher social groups from living on upper floors (cf. Gentile, 2015). Finally, our findings support the suggestion advanced by Harris (2015): that researchers should disrupt the theories and imaginations of the relationship between the height and social status that are dominated by observation from the very specific context of mega-cities.…”

“…Lower-income groups are generally found on the groundfloor and the top floor(s). Finally, a recent study of the location of the poor in Luhansk, Ukraine, almost two decades after the collapse of socialism, provides further evidence of the separation of lower social groups on the top floors and corner apartments of socialistera apartment blocks (Gentile, 2015).…”

“…In summary, limited and fragmented evidence from Eastern Europe suggests that vertical segregation was present in socialist cities, it was the product of socialist housing allocation, and social and demographic differences were reflected in segregation patterns. However, available empirical studies portray selected neighborhoods (Jerzy, 1986), or a specific type of housing (Gentile, 2015;Musil, 1985), rather than draw a comprehensive picture of vertical segregation in urban contexts. With this in mind, to investigate the legacy of within-building segregation in two apartment building typespre-and post-World War II multistory apartment buildingswe explore demographic and socioeconomic characteristics of residents of apartment buildings in Bucharest in 1992.…”

Digital nomads in siliconising Cluj: Material and allegorical double dispossession

“…This correlates with Cocola-Gant’s argument (2018) that gentrifying areas frequently become the objects of tourism consumption, so that gentrification and touristification become entwined in a cyclical loop. It further aligns with Gentile’s observation (2015: 139) that in Eastern European cities, gentrification was induced first by the closing of functional gaps and then by the migration of wealthy expat populations. Indeed, prior to 2008, ‘gentrifiers’ in Romanian cities were mostly tied to local scenarios; after, they became imbricated in international dynamics (Chelcea et al, 2015: 127).…”