Yesterday was a launch event for a book by old friend Matthias Bernt, The Commodification Gap: gentrification and public policy in London, Berlin and St Petersburg, published by Wiley in the IJURR book series.
It’s a great book and I highly recommend it, though the theorisation is not one I subscribe to. The launch event turned out to be a good discussion with Loretta Lees and me following Matthias’ summary of the book, all chaired by Hyun Ban Shin of LSE. The video recording is at https://www.facebook.com/LSESEAC/videos/1254068645448989
Order the book direct: https://www.wiley.com/en-gb/The+Commodification+Gap%3A+Gentrification+and+Public+Policy+in+London%2C+Berlin+and+St+Petersburg-p-97811196030
My speaking notes:
Overall response: The core of this book is three superb studies which have just the kind of analytical approach which is most valuable in understanding housing processes with a comparative gaze: specifically…
- Long historical timeline, with periodisation a product of the analysis
- State/capital relation varies as part of each story, & multi-scale state a key feature
- Rent & property markets seen as relationships between classes and between individuals, with careful attention to tenures
- Financialisation always a dimension of the process
- Very valuable emphasis on degrees and forms of commodification/decommodification and the related political struggles
Learning from each other across national boundaries – great examples in last pages of the book.
This is just the kind of work I have been attempting to foster among our students since founding a masters programme on property and planning in Europe decades ago. Now I have to re-do some of Friday’s lecture which is wonderful.
What am I worried about? Why am I not the best person to comment on this book?
- I never really got comfortable with rent gaps, or the rent gap literature and am amazed by how massive it clearly is. I have been well served by Marx, Harvey, Fine, Haila and co in the analysis of rent and the contradictions generated in private land ownership. Landed property issues are seen as part of class struggle and rent theory is all about conditions which can lead to potential for rent….not deterministic. Very dynamic relationships in which change can reverse the power relations…
- I’ve never been much of a user of the notion of ‘gentrification’ despite having been taught by Ruth Glass (and been heavily involved as a DIY culprit, an opponent and a beneficiary of the processes which it comprises). For me it is a helpful descriptive and campaigning term but I don’t think it should be codified in to law or policy or treated as a fundamental concept like accumulation or exploitation.
Where next?
Extend the comparative analysis to more countries and production regimes: e.g. Greece and Turkey very interesting cases where specific regimes of housing development arose (for reasons), flourished, forming social classes in the process, then were superceded (for reasons).
Pay more attention to reversing the commodification through adding controls, tax regimes, conditions. The case material in this book would be invaluable in this and without this sort of analysis policy transfer notoriously fails.
Specifically in England (& Wales) the current collapse of mediaeval leasehold as a tenure form is fascinating. A tremedous shock for marxists and neo-classical writers alike when the state fails to maintain an effective market. Accumulation in the production of flats (so crucial in London) grinding to a halt, and second-hand resales too? State also abdicating responsibility for safety of buildings and some members of our bizarre parliament maintaining that the state should stay out of these matters.
michael edwards 