A Recipe for Conflict in the Historic Environment of Istanbul

The Case of Tarlabasi

Authors

  • Aysegul Can Istanbul Medeniyet University

Keywords:

state-led gentrification, urban regeneration, displacement, global South, social inequality, urban renovation

Abstract

This paper aims to examine the processes of gentrification from a somewhat different point of view. It focuses on ‘renovation’ and ‘regeneration projects’, as well as the gentrification concept with regard to urban policies that have particularly enriched the holders of capital in the historic neighbourhoods of Istanbul. Gentrification, happening alongside with renovation and regeneration, reveals significant problems in the social structure of the city such as displacement, social polarization, social inequality and damage to the historical environment. This paper contributes to the expansion of the understanding of gentrification concept with a case study that is outside the scope of ‘usual suspects’, while theorizing the role of the Turkish state during urban transformation processes through the everyday struggles and conflicts that unfold on the ground.

References

Aksoy, Alaatin 2001. Gecekondudan Varosa Donusum: 1990’larda ‘Biz ve Oteki’ Kurgusu, Dısarıda Kalanlar,Bırakılanlar [Transfromation from Slum to Ghetto: the Structure of ‘Us and Them’ in the 1990s, Outsiders]. (Istanbul: Baglam Yayıncılık).

Alpan, Basak 2012. AKP’s ‘Conservative Democracy’ as an Empty Signifier in Turkish Politics: Shifts and Challenges after 2002. Paper presented at IPSA 22nd World Conference of Political Science, Spain.

Atkinson, Rowland and Bridge, Gary (Eds). 2005. Gentrification in a Global Context: The New Urban Colonialism. London: Routledge.

Aybek, Erdal 2018. Tarlabasi’nda Yasam Kulturu Yok Oldu, Yok Edildi [Every day Culture in Tarlabasi is Destroyed]. In Tarlabasi: Bir Kent Mucadelesi [Tarlabasi: A Right to City Struggle]. Istanbul: TMMOB Mimarlar Odası.

Bayat, Asef 2012. Politics in the city‐inside‐out. City & Society, 24(2), 110-128.

Bayat, Asef 2013. The quiet encroachment of the ordinary. Retrieved from https://chimurengachronic.co.za/quiet-encroachment-of-the-ordinary-2/

Beauregard, Robert 1984. Structure, agency and urban redevelopment. In Capital, class and urban structure. Beverly Hills: Sage Publications.

Bhaskar, Roy 1979. The Possibility of Naturalism: A Philosophical Critique of the Contemporary Human Sciences. Brighton: The Harvester Press, Brighton.

Bhaskar, Roy 1986. Scientific Realism and Human Emancipation. London:Verso.

Bhaskar, Roy 1989. Reclaiming Reality: A Critical Introduction to Contemporary Philosophy. London:Verso.

Brenner, Neil and Theodore, Nik 2002. Cities and geographies of actually existing Neoliberalism. Antipode, 34 (3), 349-379.

Butler, Tim 2005. Gentrification and globalization : the emergence of a middle range theory. In Cahier européen dupôle Ville/metropolis/cosmopolis, 1-34.

Butler, Tim and Lees, Loretta 2006. Journal Compilation. London: Royal Geographical Society.

Cagliyan‐Icener, Zeynep 2009. The Justice and Development Party’s Conception of “Conservative Democracy”: Invention or Reinterpretation?, Turkish Studies, 10(4) 595-612.

Can, Aysegul 2013. Neo-Liberal Urban Politics in the Historical Environment of Istanbul - The Issue of Gentrification. Planlama, 23 (2), 95-104.

Can, Aysegul 2016. The Relationship Between Neighbourhood Renovation and Gentrification in Historic Environment: Example of Istanbul (Unpublished PhD Thesis). University Of Sheffield, Sheffield.

Çavuşoğlu, Erbatur and Strutz, Julia 2014. Producing force and consent: Urban transformation and corporatism in Turkey. City: analysis of urban trends, culture, theory, policy, action, 18(2), 134-148.

Davidson, Mark 2008. Spoiled mixture – where does state-led “positive” gentrification end?. Urban Studies, 45, 2385-405.

Haberturk 2012. ‘Tarlabasi will be a rose garden in three and a half years’. Retrieved 15.0.2015 from http://imgzadaca.mediatriple.net/tarlabasi360/img/basin/00018.jpg

Hasan, Arif 2015. Value Extraction from Land and Real Estate in Karachi. In Global Gentrificaitons: Uneven Development and Displacement, Policy Press: Bristol.

Huse, Tone 2014. Everyday Life in The Gentrifying City: On Displacement, Ethnic Privileging and The Right to Stay Put. Surrey: Ashgate.

Islam, Tolga 2010. Current Urban Discourse. Urban Transformation and Gentrification in Istanbul. Architectural Design 80, 58–63.

Islam, Tolga and Sakizlioglu, Bahar 2015. The Making of and Resistance to State-led Gentrification in Istanbul, Turkey. In Global Gentrificaitons: Uneven Development and Displacement, Policy Press: Bristol.

Jelinek, Csaba 2011. State-led gentrification and relocation in Budapest: vacating a house in Ferencvaros. Paper presented at the International RC21 conference.

Kaidesoja, Tuukka 2009. The Concept of Social Structure in Roy Bhaskar’s Critical Realism. In Studies on Ontological and Methodological Foundations of Critical Realism in the Social Sciences, Jyväskylä: University of Jyväskylä.

Kirkness, Paul 2014. The cités strike back: Restive responses to territorial taint in the French banlieues. Environment and Planning A, 46(6), 1281-1296.

Korotayev, Andrey, Malkov, Artemy and Khaltourina, Daria 2006. Introduction to Social Macrodynamics: Compact Macromodels of the World System Growth. Moscow: URSS.

Krijnen, Marieke and Beukelaer, Christiaan 2015. Capital, State and Conflict: The Various Drivers of Diverse Gentrification Process in Beirut, Lebanon. In Global Gentrifications: Uneven Development and Displacement, Policy Press: Bristol.

Kuymulu, Mehmet B. 2013. Reclaiming the right to the city: Reflections on the urban uprisings in Turkey. City, 17, (3).

Kuyucu, Tuna and Ünsal, Ozlem 2010. ‘Urban Transformation’ as State-led Property Transfer: An Analysis of Two Cases of Urban Renewal in Istanbul. Urban Studies, 47(7), 1479-99.

Lees Loretta, Shin, Hyun B and Lopes-Morales, Ernesto (Eds.) 2015. Global Gentrifications: Uneven Development and Displacement, Policy Press: Bristol.

Lees, Loretta 2012. The geography of gentrification: Thinking through comparative urbanism. Progress in Human Geography, 36.2, 155-171.

Lees, Loretta 2014. Gentrification in the Global South? In Parnell, S. and Oldfield, S. (Eds.) The Routledge Handbook on Cities of the Global South. London: Routledge.

Lees, Loretta, Shin, Hyun B and Lopes-Morales, Ernesto 2016. Planetary Gentrification. Cambridge: Polity Press.

Lees, Loretta, Slater, Tom and Wyly, Elvin 2008. Gentrification. New York: Routledge.

Ley, David (2003). Artists, aestheticisation and the field of gentrification.Urban Studies, 40.12, 2527-2544.

Ley, David and Teo, Sin Yih 2014. Gentrification in Hong Kong?Epistemology vs. Ontology. International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, 38(4), 1286-303.

Lopez-Morales, Ernesto 2011. Gentrification by Ground Rent Dispossession: The Shadows Cast by Large Scale Urban Renewal in Santiago de Chile. International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, 35(2), 330-57.

Lopez-Morales, Ernesto 2015. Gentrification in the Global South. City, 19(4), 564-573.

Paton, Kirsten 2014. Gentrification: A Working Class Perspective. Ashgate, Surrey.

Roy, Ananya 2015. Introduction: The Aporias of Poverty. In Roy, A. and Crane, E.S. (Eds.) Territories of Poverty. Georgia: University of Georgia Press.

Sabah Newspaper 2012. ‘Tarlabasi will be complete in three years’. Retrieved 15.0.2015 from http://imgzadaca.mediatriple.net/tarlabasi360/img/basin/00012.jpg.

Sakizlioglu, Bahar 2018. Tarlabasinda Yikim Golgesinde Yasam [Living in Tarlabasi in Shadow of Demolition]. In Tarlabasi: Bir Kent Mucadelesi [Tarlabasi: A Right to City Struggle]. Istanbul: TMMOB Mimarlar Odası.

Sakizlioglu, Bahar and Uitermark, Justus 2014. The symbolic politics of gentrification: the restructuring of stigmatized neighborhoods in Amsterdam and Istanbul. Environment and Planning A, 46: 1369-1385.

Sassen, Saskia 2001. The global city: New York, London, Tokyo. Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press.

Sassen, Saskia 2002. Globalization and the formation of claims. In Richard Grant and John R. Short (Eds), Globalization at the Margins. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

Schindler, Seth 2015. Governing the 21st Century Metropolis and Transforming Territory. Territory, Politics, Governance, 3(1), 7-26.

Şen, Besime 2011. Kentsel mekanda uclu ittifak: sanayisizlestirme, soylulastirma, yeni orta sinif [Ternary Alliance in urban space: de-industrialization, gentrification, new middle class]. I.U. Siyasal Bilgiler Fakultesi Dergisi, 44, 1-21.

Shih, Mi 2010. The Evolving Law of Disputed Relocation: Constructing Inner-City Renewal Practices in Shanghai, 1990–2005. International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, 34.2, 350–364.

Shin, Hyun B 2008. Living on the Edge: Financing post-displacement Housing in Urban Redevelopment Projects in Seoul. Environment and Urbanization, 20(2), 411-26.

Shin, Hyun B 2009a. Property-based Redevelopment and Gentrification: The Case of Seoul, South Korea. Geoforum, 40(5), 906-17.

Shin, Hyun B and Kim Soo-Hyun 2015. The Developmental State, Speculative Urbanisation and the Politics of Displacement in Gentrifying Seoul. Urban Studies.

Slater, Tom 2015. Planetary Rent Gaps. Antipode 00: 1-24.

Smith, Neil 1979. Toward a theory of gentrification: a back to the city movement by capital, not people. Journal of the American Planning Association, 45, 538-48.

Smith, Neil 1996. The New Urban Frontier: Gentrification and The Revanchist City. London: Routledge.

Smith, Neil 2002. New globalism, new urbanism: gentrification as global urban strategy. Antipode, 34, 427-450.

Sonmez, Mustafa 2012. Turkey’s second privatization agency: TOKI. Retrieved 20.02.2014 from www.reflectionsturkey.com/?p=489.

Star Newspaper 2012. ‘Tarlabasi is a poisoned princess.We are healing her.’ Retrieved 15.0.2015 from http://imgzadaca.mediatriple.net/tarlabasi360/img/basin/00014.jpg.

Tekeli, Ilhan 1982. Turkiye'de Kentlesme Yazilari [Essays on Urbanization in Turkey]. Ankara: Turhan Kitabevi.
The Chamber of Architects Archive, 2008-2010 40th Working report. Istanbul: The
Chamber of Architects.

Topçuoglu, L.S. 2006. the Conservative-Democratic Identity of the Justice and Development Party in the Turkish Centre-Right Tradition’, unpublished M.S.c. Thesis, Ankara: METU

Türkün, Asuman 2011. Urban Regeneration and Hegemonic Power Relations. International Planning Studies, 16(1), 61 -72.

Türkün, Asuman and Şen, Besime 2009. Radical Transformations in Historic Urban Centers and Squatter Housing Neighborhoods in Istanbul. Presented at RC21 Congress, Inequality, Inclusion and the Sense of Belonging. Sao Paulo.

Unsal, Binnur O. 2015. State-led urban regeneration in Istanbul: Power struggles between interest groups and poor communities. Housing Studies, 30 (8), 1299-1316

Vatan Newspaper 2012. ‘Tarlabasi will create a domino effect’. Retrieved 15.0.2015 from http://imgzadaca.mediatriple.net/tarlabasi360/img/basin/00016.jpg.

Wacquant, Loic 2008. Relocating gentrification: the working class, science and the state in recent urban research. International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, 32(1), 198-205.

Wu, Fulong 2004. Residential Location under Market Orientated Development: The Process and Outcomes in Urban China. Geoforum, 35, 453-70.

Downloads

Published

2020-04-15

How to Cite

Can, A. (2020). A Recipe for Conflict in the Historic Environment of Istanbul: The Case of Tarlabasi. ACME: An International Journal for Critical Geographies, 19(1), 131–162. Retrieved from https://acme-journal.org/index.php/acme/article/view/1876