Globalizing Ghettos and Immigrant Entrepreneurship: How to Survive in a Spatial Ecosystem?1

Guney S., Alp T.

Urbanities, cilt.10, sa.2, ss.94-108, 2020 (ESCI) identifier

  • Yayın Türü: Makale / Tam Makale
  • Cilt numarası: 10 Sayı: 2
  • Basım Tarihi: 2020
  • Dergi Adı: Urbanities
  • Derginin Tarandığı İndeksler: Emerging Sources Citation Index (ESCI), Scopus
  • Sayfa Sayıları: ss.94-108
  • Anahtar Kelimeler: Berlin/Kreuzberg, de-ethnicization, ethnic mixing, ethnicization, German-Turkish entrepreneurs
  • Galatasaray Üniversitesi Adresli: Evet

Özet

This article aims to discuss the effects of neoliberalism and its socio-economic complications on ethnic entrepreneurship within a traditional ghetto environment. One aspect of this examination is the specific spatial issues and urban uneasiness derived from the loosening of spatial fabric. The other aspect is the strategies to exist, which are produced by the endeavour to protect spatiality. In this study, we took the German-Turkish entrepreneurs in Berlin/Kreuzberg, and their economic activities as ethnographic subjects. Our study shows that immigrant businesses have a tendency to develop four different strategies for holding on to space: Ethnicization, Neutralization, Ethnic Mixing, and De-Ethnicization. We have analysed these strategies in the context of the potential of the reproduction of the space and the struggle to regain the right to the city, and concluded that the demand for the right to the city cannot be limited to forming ethnic cultural anchors and simply taking pragmatic economic precautions.