Since the late 1960s and early 1970s, many American cities experienced the process of gentrification, and there are many studies based on data from this time period. A first purpose of this study was to follow up on the development of gentrification in the 1980s. Northwest Portland, Oregon, is culturally clearly defined as a gentrifying neighborhood and was, therefore, chosen as to empirically assess this process by comparing the 1980 with the 1990 census data. There is some theoretical confusion about the concept of gentrification. There is, however, general consensus on two aspects. The first is a physical renovation of old and run-down inner-city neighborhoods, and the second is a change in the demographic composition of the revitalizing neighborhood from low and middle to upper-middle and high status residents. One aspect of gentrification is largely ignored by empirical studies, but often assumed to flow from physical renovation and compositional change, i.e, an alteration in the fabric of social life in the gentrified area, in patterns of interaction and symbolic attachment. It was a second purpose of this study to explore this issue on the basis of longitudinal survey data collected in the Northwest neighborhood in 1978 and 1993. The census analysis showed that the demographic change in Northwest Portland was surprisingly consistent with Gale's original stage model of gentrification from 1980, but not with predictions for more recent times. The analysis of the survey data showed a lack of overall change in the interactional and symbolic fabric of community life. T-tests for distinct life-cycle stages and socioeconomic status showed a perception of the Northwest neighborhood as a nicer and safer place for all groups. The young were found to form a community consistent with the model of a "community of limited liability." Specifically for older and high income residents it is proposed that the demographic change, which made the neighborhood more status homogeneous, had an important socially integrating impact, consistent with Claude Fischer's notion of "critical mass" creating viable subcultures, since they were found, in opposition to common expectations, to have increased attachment and social contacts in the neighborhood.

In South Africa, gentrification has a huge impact on the makeup of city spaces where it has been used as a redevelopment tool in order to restore and enhance these spaces. However, socio-economic turmoil is created when development benefits mainly the elite minority whilst marginalising the poor majority, which occurs in many instances of gentrification. In the worst cases, gentrification creates a trickle-up affect whereby the benefits of such a process are felt predominantly by the urban elite. This is evident in this study, where gentrification at the Point Precinct in Durban led to the marginalisation of residents of the Ark, a Christian-run homeless shelter that was forced to shut down as its residents no longer fitted in with the image-conscious ideals of the redeveloping area. These residents were displaced and ultimately relocated to a severely under-developed area known as Welbedacht approximately 30km away. This study aimed to explore the negative socio-economic impacts of displacement as a result of this gentrification and found that these impacts are vast, severe and long-lasting, including the social implications of isolation and exclusion coupled with the economic loss of living along the periphery. The implications of displacement are severe primarily due to the following reasons: the community’s displacement from the core to the urban periphery, the lack of social justice in the area, and the high levels of social exclusion. Furthermore, the implications of the gentrification process itself has resulted in a cycle of impoverishment in which Welbedacht has become entrenched. Due to the neo-liberal policies favoured by developers and policy makers, the urban poor are pushed out of the core and into the periphery with little support from local government, thereby resulting in the further marginalisation of a vulnerable community. Developers and policy makers should therefore strive for development that is equitable for all parties. Furthermore, facilities such as homeless shelters which provide countless services to the urban poor should not be shut down, but rather local government should strive to either redevelop such facilities or relocate them to an area that offers the same characteristics for the continued successful socio-economic development of the urban poor. / Geography / M. Sc. (Geography)