Artikel

Stedelijke managers en stedelijke woonpatronen: een overzicht van het ontstaan en de evolutie van de institutionele benaderingswijze in de stadssociologie en -geografie

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Abstract

Urban managers and urban housing patterns - This article contains an overview of the rise and development of the institutional approach in urban sociology and urban geography, called ’the urban managerial approach’. The object of this framework of study are the ’urban managers’. These, according to Pahl, ’crucial urban types’ impose their values on the other partners operating in the urban housing system. Thus they direct households who are looking for a home to neighbourhoods which, in their opinion, fit in with their characteristics. In this way they create new housing patterns or they consolidate existing patterns. Urban managers are individuals (e.g. real estate agents) as well as institutions (e.g. mortgage banks); urban managers belong to the private sector (e.g. building firms; private developers,...) as well as to the public sector (e.g. urban planners; managers of public housing,...). The managerial thesis has its roots in the social fabric of the sixties and, in this respect, it is a result of new questions social scientists started to ask : they no longer took the world for granted. Following the introduction, the first part of the text deals with this societal context and the impact on the rise of the managerial approach. The second part deals with some early publications which can be considered as belonging to that approach. The ideas of John Rex are very crucial here. Next the publications of the so-called founding father, Ray E. Pahl, are examined. In the fourth part, the more recent evolution is discussed. This can be summarized as a search for a theory, for a context. For too long researchers working within this framework have stressed an empirical approach. Building a sufficient theory was ignored. In the last two parts the managerial approach is illustrated with examples from the private sector (the financial institutions involved in structuring the urban housing system) and from the public sector (housing organized by the different governments).

How to Cite:

De Decker, P., (1987) “Stedelijke managers en stedelijke woonpatronen: een overzicht van het ontstaan en de evolutie van de institutionele benaderingswijze in de stadssociologie en -geografie”, Tijdschrift voor Sociale Wetenschappen 32(3), 244–281. doi: https://doi.org/10.21825/tvsw.94956