FIGHTING FOR THE CITY: rent madness, gentrification and displacement - and what you can do about it

Andrej Holm
is an urban and regional sociologist at the Humboldt University in Berlin. He conducts research on urban regeneration, gentrification and housing policy in international comparison.

Gentrification, the valorisation of previously inexpensive residential areas, has become a constant companion of urban change and stands for the neoliberal version of capitalist urbanisation. Renovated buildings and new commercial uses not only stand for a change in the city, but above all for rising housing costs, the displacement of the economically disadvantaged and the implementation of new social structures in the affected neighbourhoods. Even in Vienna, rents are rising and inner-city living is gradually becoming difficult to afford, despite the fact that social housing construction is significant by international standards.

Andrej Holm uses international examples to trace the background and modes of action of urban gentrification dynamics as well as the strategies of neighbourhood movements and anti-gentrification mobilisations.

Moderation
Robert Misik, journalist and author