The landscape of gentrification: exploring the diversity of “upgrading” processes in Hong Kong, 1986–2006

Abstract

In the late twentieth century, Hong Kong experienced a transformation from an industrial to a specialized services and high-tech economy. Accompanying this shift, extensive local redevelopment has fundamentally altered the physical and social characteristics of the city. This analysis explores the physical and social transformation of Hong Kong from 1986 to 2006, examining the diversity of gentrification processes. The specific questions focus on: (1) How extensive are gentrification processes operating within Hong Kong? and (2) What is the role of new-builds in facilitating displacement? Principal component analysis and K-means clustering are used to identify areas within Hong Kong that are experiencing physical and social upgrading. From the quantitative analysis, three neighborhoods—Kennedy Town, Tiu Keng Leng, and Yuen Long—are selected for a qualitative study into the complexity and the diversity of capital reinvestment, social conflict, and displacement.

Keywords:

• displacement
• gentrification
• Hong Kong

Acknowledgments

We are very grateful to Dr Richard Shearmur and the anonymous reviewers for their critiques of the manuscript. Their suggestions were important in helping improve the quality of the article.

Notes

1. The TPU in Hong Kong is a similar concept to the census tract in the United States. They are both roughly the same spatial area; however, TPUs contain a larger population than typical US census tracts due to the higher population densities in Hong Kong.

2. In Hong Kong, all land is owned by the government. A premium is charged for land transactions under this land tenure system.

3. The research covers the years 1986–2006 because of Hong Kong’s tremendous urban restructuring during this period. These urban redevelopment processes, in part, reflect Hong Kong’s transition from an industrial-based economy to a specialized services and high-tech economy.

4. In the clustering process, instead of using randomly select initial seeds, we use a pre-defined initial seeds based on the status of the initial year (1986). One reason for this approach is to try and reveal further diversity of gentrification among the clusters, which would allow us to identify groupings in Hong Kong that have experienced different gentrification typologies.

5. TPUs that have been captured in these three clusters but that do not show gentrification are excluded from this calculation, after field surveys and historical analysis.

6. The Small Housing Policy was introduced in 1972. It entitles “an indigenous villager to apply for permission to erect for himself during his lifetime a small house on a suitable site within his own village.” The small house is designed for the occupancy by the indigenous villager himself or his family and should not exceed 700 ft²(65 m²) in the building footprint and it cannot be any more than three stories in height. It can be built either on privately owned land with premiums waived or on government land at a concessionary premium. The indigenous villagers refer to male descendants of villagers who were inhabitants of the village when the British took over the New Territories (Nissim, 1998).

While it does not explain all of the redevelopment in Yuen Long, there are two common practices used by developers in abusing the SHP to facilitate physical and social upgrading in the neighborhood. Developers might purchase the small houses from indigenous villagers after Certificates of Compliance are issued. Developers might even recruit qualified indigenous villagers to apply for the building license to develop a piece of land that is already owned by the developer (Hopkinson & Lao, 2003; Nissim, 1998). The relatively cheap land cost gives developers incentives to buy small houses and/or small house rights. If buildings exist on the parcel of land, multistorey buildings or extensive villa-type developments can then be built to attract upper-income earners. Due to the land scarcity and increasing housing demand, profits are extensive with these small house lot projects.