Segregation: The Ghetto And The Gated Community

The advancement of the society brings with it the development of the forms of living as well as the development of the principles of urban life in the neighborhood. The modern day society does not only witness the emergence of relatively new neighborhood formats but also the continuation of the forms that were well known during the previous time. The segregation of people within neighborhoods still remains the problem for large numbers of population. At the same time, earlier segregation was perceived only in the form of disregarding the people who have fewer resources for life and should be separated. In contrast, modern segregation has evolved to continue even among the well-off layers of the society. With respect to this, the ghettos can

It is widely believed that the segregation is the most important issue contributing to the development of social division as well as the economic division. When referring to ghetto, one would often mention the idea of black ghetto. This is connected to the phenomenon of the great migration of African Americans from the rural South to the industrial Northeast, Midwest, and Far West which “blackened” the image of an American city and caused high resistance from the white population (Avila 5). Thus, the black people were obliged to live in the ghettos since they were rejected by the local population. Nevertheless, ghetto refers not only to the racial or ethnic relations so that there are also examples of white ghettos where white people are excluded from the community for a definite reason, such as cultural or economic. In any case, it is important to mention that “not all ghettos are poor and not all poor areas are (inside) ghettos” (Wacquant 14). Perceived in contrast to the gated communities, ghettos are considered to be poorer and with more black representatives. However, viewing modern gated communities or suburbans in this light tends to be a

Nevertheless, both phenomena can also be said to have the similar meaning in terms of promoting the specific features of the group and community. While ghettos are created by the influence from the outside and the gated communities are developed from the inside, they both create the environment where the notion of otherness and standing out is not appreciated. Being excluded from the community, ghettos develop their own replacement of the institutions and establish own principles of life within their territory. Having little access to the outside environment, they develop their own feeling of community and strong ties to the people who live in the neighborhood. Thus, ghettos make the people more united, which can be evident from the examples of racial riots in different states. On the contrary, the gated communities contribute to the diminishing of the role of communality in the lives of the representatives. While gated communities “separate a homogeneous group from the larger society, creating a “between-group” distinction”, they also tend to diminish the meaning of large group (Morgan 26). They create physical barriers to movement and entry developing in this way the stronger basis for exclusion. At the same time, ghetto representatives are not allowed the mobility and restricted from the