The Roles of Gentrification in Creation of Diverse Urbanities of Tokyo

Abstract

This article focuses on the role of gentrification in urban regeneration. It supports calls for a more nuanced approach to understanding of that complex phenomenon, which would include the possibility that some of its forms may represent the much needed transfusion of new and healthy energies into tired urbanities. The examples of gentrification presented in this article indicate that some of the outcomes of certain kinds of gentrification are superior to those generated by “proper”, even well considered and well theorised examples of urban regeneration. Those examples are from Tokyo, the largest and one of the fastest-changing cities in the world. The chosen locations are in the precincts of Nezu and Yanaka, where living connections with the past coexist with practices of the bustling World City, and in vibrant, commercially driven Harajuku. The article advocates locally attuned approaches to cultural sustainability, and careful balancing of gentrification with urban regulation. That may help cities remain, as de Certeau once said, the ‘most immoderate of human texts’.