Conflicted social mix and the ambivalence toward urban Others: Ethnographic exploration of urban regeneration in a liminal space in Tel Aviv

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article offers the term conflicted social mix to address newcomers’ dilemmas in a transforming liminal space. It is based on ethnographic fieldwork conducted in 2019–2021 in Gan HaHashmal, a regenerating area located between Tel Aviv’s wealthier north and relatively lower-income south. The area is characterized by a mix of upper-middle-class newcomers, homeless people, and drug users, and a lack of community cohesion due to spatial liminality. The proposed conceptualization reveals that although the newcomers may have originally wished to be part of this “raw” urbanity and urban development process, in practice, they aim to establish a sterile community of their own, while excluding urban Others. They express empathy for the latter’s vulnerability while confessing their difficulty to share the space with them. Newcomers’ perceptions, narratives, and spatial experiences highlight the theoretical significance of the conflicted social mix concept for Tel Aviv’s morphology, as well as for other contested neoliberal spaces.