Sinks of Social Exclusion or Springboards for Social Mobility? Analysing the Roles of Disadvantaged Neighbourhoods in Urban Australia

Abstract

For two decades analysts have noted significant and growing socio-spatial polarisation in Australia’s cities. Dominating policy discourse has been the hypothesis that residence in “poverty neighbourhoods” can compound individual disadvantage. Prominent here are concerns about social exclusion and spatial entrapment. A contrary perspective is that low income communities often contain substantial social capital and that accessing relatively affordable housing available in such places may provide a basis for subsequent “progression” in the wider urban housing market. Drawing on a household survey in four disadvantaged Sydney neighbourhoods, we confirm that rates of socio-economic deprivation indeed substantially exceed citywide and national norms and that the perceived incidence of neighbourhood problems is substantial. At the same time, results reveal that such places are far from unmitigated spaces of alienation and suggest that they can provide springboards for geographical and social mobility.

近二十年来，分析人士注意到澳大利亚城市社会-空间出现了严重的分化。主流政策话语认为“贫困社区”的居民遭遇各种个人劣势的夹击。另一种相反的观点则指出，低收入社区常常蕴含着相当丰富的社会资本，鼓励人们到这样的地方购买低价房能为整个城市住房市场的“进步”提供基础。本文通过在悉尼四个贫困社区的家庭调查，表明这些社区的社会-经济剥夺率的确远远高于城市和全国正常水平，居民们感受到的社区问题也非常严重。同时，调查结果也显示这些地方并非彻底异化的空间，而是有地理和社会迁徙的跳板。

Keywords:

• Socio-spatial disadvantage
• residential mobility
• housing markets

Notes

1. The English indices of deprivation measure relative deprivation in small areas—a comparable resource to SEIFA.

2. Our focus on “suburbs” recognised the advantage of working with spatial units having intrinsic meaning to residents and policymakers. Equally, typical unit size (2006 average suburb population in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane: 5360) needed to be sufficient for sound quantitative analysis.

3. Widely used since 1990, Australia’s ABS Socio-Economic Index for Areas (SEIFA) is designed to “identify and rank areas in terms of relative socio-economic advantage and disadvantage” (ABS 2008, p. 5). SEIFA values are derived from census variables, whose selection is “guided by international research” on the topic (ibid).In this research, a disadvantaged suburb was defined as one in which at least 50% of ABS Census Collector Districts (CDs) were in the lowest quintile of the national SEIFA distribution.

4. For reference, the New South Wales lowest quintile gross household income in 2013/14 was $1931 (ABS 2015). It should be acknowledged that analysis of survey data on incomes utilised household unit data rather than equivalised data. While equivalisation might be an ideal approach, we took the view that the inherently limited quality of the income data that can be collected through a low-cost survey would not justify such treatment.

5. Indirectly relevant here is the statistic for England showing that, in 2009/10, 76% of surveyed adults reported a feeling of local belonging (DCLG 2011).

6. Car hooning is misbehaviour involving speeding or reckless driving.

7. Only one in five households subject to exclusion in terms of community identity were also subject to economic exclusion (and one in four vice versa).