Urban Social Sustainability Research Articles

Cityscapes of Hunting and Fishing: Yoruba Place-Making and Cultural Heritage for a Sustainable Urban Vision

Literature on African urbanism has generally lacked insight into the significant roles of hunters and fishers as city founders. This has resulted in a knowledge gap regarding the cultural foundation of the cities that could enhance policy frameworks for sustainable urban governance. This article examines corollaries related to the complementarities of hunting and urbanism with case studies from the ethno-linguistic Yoruba region in southwestern Nigeria. Through qualitative methodologies involving ethnography and the (oral) history of landscapes of hunting from the pre-colonial and (British) colonial periods, as well as tracing the current cultural significance of hunting in selected Yoruba cities, the article reveals data that identify hunters and fishers as city founders. It shows that hunting, as a lived heritage, continues to be interlaced with cultural urban practices and Yoruba cosmology and that within this cultural imagery and belief, hunters remain key actors in nature conservation, contributing to socio-cultural capital, economic sustainability, and urban security structures. The article concludes with recommendations for strategies to reconnect with these value systems in rapidly westernizing urban Africa. These reconnections include the re-sacralization of desacralized landscapes of hunting, revival of cultural ideologies, decolonization from occidental conceptions, and re-definition of urbanism and place-making in light of African perspectives despite globalization. In doing so, the article contributes to a deeper understanding of the interconnections between the environmental and societal components of sustainability theory, agenda, and practice in urban contexts; underscores the societal value of lived heritage, cultural heritage, and cultural capital within the growing literature on urban social sustainability; and sheds more light on southern geographies within the social sustainability discourse, a field of study that still disproportionately reflects the global northwest.

The social implications of the vital city model: measuring the impact of urban vitality on neighbourhood sustainability

ABSTRACT Previous studies have identified vital urban spaces through the concentration of people, the diversity of land uses and buildings, accessibility, and the existence of a compact urban fabric. However, the relationship between urban vitality and social sustainability has not been studied in these terms. This paper seeks to analyse the social implications of the vital city model for residents in the context of a Latin American city: Santiago de Chile. To do so, we use the JANE index to measure the formal conditions of the built environment for urban vitality, and the Longitudinal Social Study of Chile to measure urban social sustainability. We first use a PCA technique to reveal six core components of urban social sustainability: Sense of belonging, Safety, Sociability, Well-being, Satisfaction with housing, and Conservation of the neighbourhood. We then test the associations between the strength of these six core components and the conditions for urban vitality by means of a multiple linear regression model. Significant associations between urban vitality conditions and urban social sustainability suggest that socially sustainable neighbourhoods are found in sectors with the presence of old buildings, accessibility to public transportation, and far from mega infrastructures.

Public Green Space Injustice in High-Density Post-Colonial Areas: A Case Study of the Macau Peninsula, China

Public green spaces (PGSs) play a positive role in urban social sustainability and solidarity, as all urban dwellers can access them without discrimination or restrictions, but urbanization usually leads to an extreme shortage of PGSs and thus it becomes an important spatial resource that is competed for by different groups, especially migrant populations. Taking the Macau Peninsula as an example, this study employed a hybrid analysis approach, including the spatial Gini coefficient, spatial share index and spatial quality assessment, to look at the PGS injustice in high-density post-colonial areas. The results showed that (1) there is a “spatial mismatch” in the Peninsula’s PGS; (2) significant PGS service differences have been found between the colonial group (Portuguese) and immigrant group (Southeast Asian); and (3) a comparative analysis of the changes in the equity of PGSs over the past 40 years reveals that the PGS tends to be equitable overall, but the differences between groups have gradually increased. PGS injustice mainly depends on the spatial production mechanism during the colonial period of Macau and the spatial selection and limitation of groups due to differential social integration. Based on this, this work proposes recommendations for the planning and construction of PGS in terms of urban renewal and social sustainability, as well as new reclamation areas, in Macau. This study broadens the field and helps to improve the PGS inequality in high-density post-colonial areas, aiding regional sustainable development.

Towards a socially sustainable built environment: a comparative assessment of urban neighbourhoods in Istanbul

PurposeIntegrating and advancing social sustainability is foundational to achieving the urban sustainable development goals. Given the rapid transformation of cities in the Mediterranean region, this study sought to assess residents' evaluation of social sustainability in two socio-spatially diverse neighbourhoods of metropolitan Istanbul.Design/methodology/approachA questionnaire survey, adapted from an empirically well-tested and robust social sustainability framework, was used to collect data from 197 residents from Balat and Rasimpasa neighbourhoods in Metropolitan Istanbul. The study then employed quantitative analytical techniques such as independent sample t-tests and Pearson correlation to analyse the sample data.FindingsIn both neighbourhoods, accessibility and participation were ranked the highest and lowest dimensions of social sustainability, respectively. However, the t-test analysis revealed a statistically significant difference between the two neighbourhoods regarding social networking and interaction, safety and security and participation. The differences align with emerging studies on urban social sustainability in the Mediterranean and European cities that when considered from urban spatial contexts, significant differences emerge from a social network and safety perspective.Practical implicationsOur study invites urban planners and policy makers attention to and emphasise on lowly evaluated social sustainability dimensions such as participation in their efforts to promote sustainable urban development at the neighbourhood level. We reason that opening the decision-making process to include diverse voices and experiences of residents through participatory workshops might offer opportunities for context-specific, citizen-led urban planning and design strategies that are socially sustainable.Originality/valuePrevious studies have not fully accounted for how various socio-spatial contexts at the neighbourhood level shape differential evaluation of social sustainability. This paper extends the emerging work on urban social sustainability by situating residents’ evaluation of social sustainability indicators across two unique neighbourhoods with gridded and organic spatial characteristics in Istanbul. This paper is an important addition to ongoing work on how spatial organisation of neighbourhoods can influence experiences of social sustainability from an urban planning and design perspective.

Assessing urban social sustainability with the Place Standard Tool: Measurement, findings, and guidance

This study introduces the Place Standard Tool as an instrument for assessing urban social sustainability. The Place Standard Tool was developed in Scotland as a simple framework to evaluate physical (e.g., buildings, public spaces, transport system), social (e.g., social interaction, identity and belonging, safety), and procedural (e.g., public participation, sense of control) aspects concerning places, neighborhoods, and districts. The tool was tested in three cities in Norway – Kristiansand, Stavanger, and Fredrikstad – through a transdisciplinary collaboration between researchers, municipalities, and local stakeholders. We first present the methodology we applied for testing the tool and then report some indicative findings. Next, municipal advisors present their qualitative assessment of the tool discussing its usefulness for urban planning and local governance. Finally, researchers offer theoretical and methodological guidance: they theoretically discuss the relevance of the tool for urban social sustainability, present its strengths and weaknesses, and provide methodological recommendations for future applications.

Developing places for human capabilities

This dissertation develops an understanding towards governing social sustainability goals into area-based urban development projects. It draws on Amartya Sen’s Capability Approach to construct a capability-centered evaluation of how institutionalized governance processes around these projects ultimately affect people’s freedoms to do the things they value in their urban living environment. Presenting case studies from the Netherlands, Sweden and Austria, the approach adopted in this dissertation reveals the unique ways in which different individuals interpret urban social sustainability and convert spatial resources into personal capabilities. The research uncovers the governance elements and institutional conditions around urban development projects that enable or constrain resource-to-capability conversions. It shows that governing social sustainability goals into urban development projects is a balancing act between reflexive governance action on the one hand, and an institutionalization of principles, actor responsibilities, and funding provision on the other hand. Ultimately, this dissertation argues that, to steer towards urban social sustainability, urban development practices can be improved by adopting an approach that is not merely focused on spatial improvements, but takes the equal expansion of human capabilities as its point of departure.

Social Mapping in Batam City for Urban Development

This study explores social mapping for urban communities with the aim of city development. The success of sustainable urban planning lies in achieving environmental, economic, and social sustainability in urban areas. However, the requirements for a socially sustainable city are still unclear. This paper aims to bridge the existing concept of urban social sustainability in its implementation in Batam City regarding socially sustainable urban planning. This study uses a qualitative approach. The purpose of collecting qualitative data is to explore social planning for communities in Batam City. Qualitative data collection uses in-depth interview procedures with the government and communities living in Batam City, both indigenous and immigrant communities. The selection of informants is based on a purposive sampling procedure, this is intended to explore research questions more deeply to informants in Batam City. This study contributes to the development of cross-disciplinary science in the social sciences, especially the Sociology of Development, where this scientific contribution is theoretically useful when the results of this study are published in the form of scientific publications.. In addition to publication outputs, this research is expected to be an academic contribution as a recommendation for policy makers, especially in development policies to understand sustainable urban planning through a social lens to obtain a complete picture of social sustainability scenarios and investigate how these themes can be addressed in future urban planning prospects.

Exploring International Perspective on Factors Affecting Urban Socio-Ecological Sustainability by Green Space Planning

Urban green space (UGS) is one of the most important components of urban systems to create sustainable cities. This crucial urban element performs many social and ecological functions to facilitate a better quality of life for urban residents. The main aim of this study is to identify the most critical factors contributing to cities’ social and ecological sustainability through UGS planning and development. To achieve this aim, an integrated socio-ecological approach was followed to collect and analyse the data, which comprised context analysis and an international experts survey. Therefore, firstly, the main influencing factors for urban social and ecological sustainability that can be achieved by UGS planning were extracted by reviewing the related literature. In the next step, to find the most critical factors, an online international survey of academicians and experts drawn from a number of countries was conducted. Based on the experts’ opinions, twenty-two factors out of sixty-five, including twelve social factors and ten ecological factors, achieved the highest scores. According to the results, the key factors of accessibility from the social sustainability category and protection from the ecological sustainability category play the most important roles in maximising the social and ecological benefits of UGS.

How Sustainable Is Our Urban Social-Sustainability Theory?

This short opinion article critically comments on some current mainstream trends, characteristics, and biases in urban social sustainability research literature. Through identifying some gaps regarding geography, sub-topics, and study approaches, and through considering “off-the-map” southern urban realities, it calls for the need to refocus and reshape some of the basic notions and presumptions that currently stand behind urban social sustainability theory, concepts, and policy design. Enhancing our sensitivity to truly global urban conditions, argue the authors, would result in less expected and generic (Eurocentric) approaches regarding urban social sustainability and would contribute to its more meaningful and comprehensive understanding. A bias towards qualitative, place-based, and context-sensitive analysis is a necessary step in rendering urban social sustainability truly global as well as in the making of more place-intelligent and place-responsive planning interventions.

Investigating the impacts of green spaces planning on social sustainability improvement in Tehran, Iran: a SWOT-AHP analysis

ABSTRACT Green spaces are foundational to urban social sustainability and solidarity since they are accessible to all citizens without discrimination or restriction. Such spaces enable social interactions, and as places of convergence offer a sense of belonging, participation and social sustainability. Green spaces also can directly contribute to SDG 11 “Sustainable cities and communities". This research investigates the effects of urban green spaces on the promotion of social sustainability in a case study of Tehran, Iran. By adopting both quantitative and qualitative methods, this study employs a Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats (SWOT) analysis in combination with an Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) implemented in Expert Choice software and focus group discussions. Results revealed that in order to improve social sustainability, the risk of growing insecurity in green areas among citizens and the spreading of disease due to proximity to dangerous sites were the highest overall priority values. In contrast, the lowest overall priority values belonged to the factors of sports equipment for physical activities and intellectual games and lack of attention to trees and seasonal flowers in some obsolete green spaces.

Are good intentions enough? Evaluating social sustainability in urban development projects through the capability approach

ABSTRACT Social sustainability is a multidimensional concept sensitive to the contexts of its application. This study explores how it is interpreted and applied in urban planning practices in which general social sustainability goals are translated into specific urban design interventions. Building upon Sen’s Capability Approach (CA), we analyse the gap between the operationalization of social sustainability goals in Urban Development Projects (UDPs) from the perspective of urban planners, and the following experiences of the residents in the developed urban areas. By applying a capability-based evaluative framework to a UDP in Amsterdam, the study reveals that residents value distinct urban functionings and experience different enabling factors related to urban social sustainability. We conclude that the CA provides an operationalizable framework for assessing how social sustainability goals defined at the early stage of UDPs translate in the actual capabilities of the urban residents for whom those very goals were conceived.

Panoramic Mapping of Urban Social Sustainability: A 35-Year Bibliometric and Visualization Analysis

In recent years, ensuring social sustainability has been a global concern for sustainable urban development in both the academic arena and sustainability science. Many studies have been conducted in this area, but a bibliometric analysis has not yet been done previously. This study identified research streams and research hotspots in the urban social sustainability field based on a bibliometric analysis from 1985 to 2020, involving 1,623 documents from the Web of Science database. We used two software packages, Bibliometrix (Biblioshiny) and VOSviewer, for performance and science mapping analysis. The result showed that this research field is growing fast in multiple disciplines. In the publication trend analysis, we found significant changes since 2015. Analysis of leading countries and institutions revealed that developed countries are performing better than developing countries in producing publications on urban social sustainability. In the content analysis, we selected 214 documents and found that the survey method was the most used. Additionally, we found that 13.08 percent of papers (28 out of 214) used as many as 21 different theories, where ‘stakeholder theory,’ ‘planning theory,’ ‘theory of urbanism as a way of life,’ and ‘theory of good city form’ were significantly used. The findings of this study can assist researchers and practitioners by providing valuable insights into the research area of urban social sustainability.

The Pentagon Model of Urban Social Sustainability: An Assessment of Sociospatial Aspects, Comparing Two Neighborhoods

Social concerns have caused a critical rethinking of urban space in today’s society, with sociospatial issues at the forefront of discussions. This study aims to better understand the relationship between sociospatial aspects of urban space and social sustainability. We provide a pentagon model for urban social sustainability by identifying five dimensions: person (demographic and household characteristics), place (accessibility, social infrastructure, open spaces, and places for daily operations), people (sense of community, social relations, and social network), perception (sense of place, and security and safety), and process (participation, and future of space). The research methodology includes a spatial analysis, questionnaire survey, and statistical analyses, applied to two study areas in Izmir, Turkey. The findings show that the two study areas have significantly different scores in terms of social sustainability criteria. Residents who reported their neighborhood as being more accessible and having better places for daily operations indicated a higher sense of place and participation. Residents who rated their open spaces more highly reported better social relations and social networks, and greater security and safety. In addition, there are a variety of positive associations between indicators of social sustainability. The study summarizes the relationship between social sustainability indicators, followed by a discussion.

Using Trip Completion Rates to Evaluate Urban Social Sustainability

Using Trip Completion Rates to Evaluate Urban Social Sustainability

Urban green commons for socially sustainable cities and communities

ABSTRACT In these times of global pandemics and climate crisis, social sustainability has become a crucial issue within diverse sectors and disciplines. This article aims to broaden the discussions on social sustainability in general, and in relation to community work within professional social work in particular. By means of a cross-disciplinary bricolage approach – with a focus on the commons – we aim to construct a holistic view of urban social sustainability. Beginning with the Anthropocene concept, which recognizes the human impact on the Earth’s natural systems and hence highlights the need to include the natural environment as a determinant of good and fair living conditions for all, we remix arguments and examples relating to social sustainability with environmental and spatial dimensions to develop an urban green commons. Our cross-disciplinary perspective extends beyond contemporary social policy by bringing together natural resource management, public health, and spiritual aspects of the commons. In order to fit the plurality of urban contexts across the planet, further critical deliberations are needed, focusing on social sustainability and collective action for sustainable change in each context.

Urban Densification and Social Sustainability: A Case Study of Dhaka

Dhaka is regarded as a thriving megacity of South Asia. The key challenges that the bustling hub is confronted with are land scarcity and the growing population. With limited land supply, the city is copping to accommodate its ever-growing population through two development strategies, namely densification and vertical expansion. Densification is regarded as an effective tool in guiding the urbanization process, while vertical expansion can be considered as a complementary part of this strategy. When it comes to application in an urban environment as a strategy, the subjective attributes of density need to be taken into consideration along with its objective aspects. As the concept of crowdedness differs generally among people belonging to different cultures, statuses, ethnicity, and geographic location, the livable density standard is also supposed to vary accordingly. The concept of habitable density for any community is profoundly related to the various aspects of social sustainability. Since densification has been taking place in Dhaka without any guidelines, the livability conditions with regards to the social sustainability of the city dwellers are largely compromised. Therefore, there is an urgent need to assess the sustainability of the residential areas of Dhaka, which have been developing as a by-product of the unguided densification process taking place over the recent decades.

Smart City: A Question of Social Sustainability in Urban Spaces? Assessing The Impacts of ICT on Changing Urban Behavioral Patterns in Urban Spaces of Madinaty, Egypt.

Smart city is one of the powerful concepts that have deep impacts on contemporary cities. Planners, developers, and authorities thought that change to smart city using information and communication technologies could enhance the quality of urban life; rather, still their impact on long-term change of social life and consequently on social sustainability in contemporary cities is not fully investigated. Some scholars argued that moving from conventional to smart city will greatly encourage social activities in urban space. In contrast, this research argues that increasing people familiarity with ICT will create new urban behavioral patterns that could build great barrier to urban social sustainability. It aims to take the proper precautions for any expected negative impacts on social sustainability. The research adopts a case study of three parks in Madinaty, Egypt. It aims to find the correlation exists between people familiarity with ICT and changing behavioral patterns. It is concluded that smart cities have great consequences on changing patterns of urban behavior, city spatial structure and urban social sustainability. The research recommends smart design guidelines using social, communicative, and collective activities to mitigate any expected social risks of smartness.

How Does Low-Density Urbanization Reduce the Financial Sustainability of Chinese Cities? A Debt Perspective

Low-density urbanization threatens urban social and ecological sustainability not only directly by excessively encroaching on suburban farmland and ecological space, but may also indirectly do so by undermining the financial basis of sustainable urban development. To address this relationship, this study empirically examines the effect of low-density urbanization on local government debt by using panel data of prefecture-level cities in China from 2006 to 2015. Results show that the scale of local government debt increases significantly with a rise in urban expansion. Furthermore, this study found that low-density urbanization affects local government debt in two ways. First, low-density urban expansion reduces the land output efficiency, which decreases potential fiscal revenue and thus increases local government debt. Second, low-density urban expansion raises the construction and maintenance expenditure of urban infrastructure, which increases the demand for urban construction financing and thus pushes up the scale of debt. The results of the heterogeneous study indicate that low-density urbanization significantly affects local government debt mainly in Central/Western regions, small and medium-sized cities, cities with high fiscal stress and development pressure, and residentially expanding cities. On the contrary, low-density urbanization has no significant effect on the Eastern regions, large cities, cities with low fiscal stress and development pressure, and spatially expanding cities. This study theoretically explored and empirically verified a critical indirect effect of low-density urbanization on urban sustainability by increasing fiscal risks, which is, and will continue to be, a common and vital challenge faced by cities in China and other rapidly urbanizing developing countries.

The Interplay between Urban Densification and Place Change in Tehran; Implications for Place-Based Social Sustainability

Recent scholarship on urban social sustainability has redirected its attention to the role of place-based theories and practices in achieving and sustaining social outcomes. The notion of place and its centrality in everyday life of urban citizens could be used as an anchor point to study urbanisation processes and rapid urban changes. This paper employs a place-based framework of urban social sustainability in parallel to a framework of ‘place transformation’ to examine the consequences of soft densification on place attachment at the neighbourhood level in Tehran, Iran. Through analysing sixteen semi-structured interviews with residents, this paper argues that the temporal element of soft densification makes it a place undermining process, eradicating individual and collective place memory through resetting the time of the place. Moreover, the findings highlighted parallel trajectories in the meanings associated to place by residents which underscore the contradiction between ‘lived space’ and ‘conceived space’. Furthermore, it was found that loss of place attachment due to urban densification commonly leads to passive modes of response such changing lifestyle and daily routines, and voluntary relocating to adapt to the new socio-spatial order.

Planning for Urban Social Sustainability: Towards a Human-Centred Operational Approach

In Europe, growing concerns about social segregation and social stability have pushed calls to make cities ‘inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable’ higher on policy agendas. However, how to approach such generic policy objectives and operationalise them for planning practices is still largely unclear. This article makes a conceptual contribution to the operational understanding of social sustainability in urban planning practices. The article argues that, between theoretical concept and operational forms, different evaluative approaches towards social sustainability may be taken. Evaluating three dimensions of policy operationalisations in The Netherlands, we argue that Amartya Sen’s capability approach provides a promising conceptual framework for operationalising social sustainability in cities in Europe and beyond. We compare capabilities with a more commonly applied resource-based conception to show that the former is more accurate and potentially more effective, because it shifts the evaluative space of social sustainability from means (i.e., urban resources) to ends: the eventual well-being of urban citizens.