259-1409-1-PB.pdf

The anthropologist Ferdinando Fava, who has conducted extensive ethnographic research on the Zen neighbourhood in Palermo (Fava, 2008), wrote an interesting essay titled Tra iperghetti e banlieues, la nuova marginalità urbana (Hyperghettoes and banlieues, new urban marginality). Chicago’s ghettoes, Paris’s banlieues, Barcelona’s Poligono, Amsterdam’s Probleemstandwij, Moscow’s Hrushebi, Los Angeles’ hoods. All Western cities have their own words to describe their marginal, cursed neighborhoods (Fava, 2008a). At the heart of this essay lies a question that most authors, researchers in different disciplines, have sought to answer: how did Italian suburbs change because of the end of a production mode - the ‘world factory’ - and the arrival of massive migration flows?

New Metropolitan Perspectives NMP 2020. Smart Innovation, Systems and Technologies., 2021

At a time when the seek for a broader understanding of contemporary suburbs is finding a reasonable global consideration, a specific attention to the suburbanisms, i.e. suburban ways of living, is still a slightly unexplored issue in the governance agenda. Despite the significance of insightful researches, studies and theories of Italian urbanization, Italian suburbs look wedged between urban and rural agendas, without finding a reasonable framework on which to build further strategies aimed at tackling the increasing socio-spatial inequalities that are unevenly shaping Italian in-between urban edges. According to these viewpoints, the paper employs a theoretical discussion of the marginal condition experienced by Italian suburbs, framing such marginality in few steps. First, the paper runs into the complexities of "suburban Italy" in a post-suburban framework. Second, moving from these first insights, the existence of Italian suburbs is questioned in analytical terms. Third, the paper set out the conditions from which to observe the lack of strategies for the Italian urban edges, entrenched between rural and urban agenda. To conclude, a body of final remarks for further studies is introduced towards an operational setting of suburban studies with reference to Italy.

Optimistic Suburbia 2. Middle-Class Mass Housing, 2021

If we look at the demographic changes in the largest cities in Southern Italy, the most significant trend is a balance between population growth and decline, affecting in particular inner urban areas, which is due to the predominance of new ethnic inhabitants. After having described these demographic changes in Naples and Palermo, the paper will include some considerations on the ‘institutional’ landscape of planning and the related policies. How do planning policies and practices face this quick change in such peripheral contexts, which are new to the phenomenon? Can the plural composition of the local society be viewed as an opportunity, and not just as a threat? The paper will use some analyses of the immigrants’ distribution and characteristics of housing problems as elements of discussions of the changes in the urban social structure, which can be considered as positive potential for a more equal and culturally mixed context.

The area at North of Piazzale Loreto is a former working class, productive district located in the north-eastern periphery of Milan. Since the late 1990s it is at the centre of a significant territorial and social transformation process, which has been rhetorically represented and interpreted in different and often diverging ways. Such representations respectively focused on urban blight and insecurity; multiculturalism, integration and social cohesion; and, more recently, on the branding of the area as the new “hip” district of the city. Nevertheless, local transformation and development dynamics appear to be more complex than what such rhetoric show. Our contribution therefore aims at broadening the understanding of such dynamics, especially for what concerns the interrelationship among the new social fabric and the physical environment. Ultimately, we will then discuss the potential policy implications and challenges that arise from the current development trends.

One of the oucomes of a national reasearch about metropolis, post-metropolis and urban regions in Italy. This paper is included in A. Balducci, V. Fedeli & F. Curci (eds), Post-metropolitan territories, London, Routledge

Avallone G. & Torre S., Do migrations have an urban vocation yet? New trends in Italian urban settlements, 2012

"""Italian statisticians and demographers observed in XXth century that generally the trend to settle in the largest urban areas is leaded by individuals seeking to enhance their quality of life. Franco Alasia and Danilo Montaldi introduced in 1960 one of the first researches on Italian internal migrations recognizing that «migrations have an urban vocation». Researches made in other national contexts obtained the same conclusions. It is possible to conclude that migrations have an urban vocation in an increasing intensification period of industrialization. Industrial crisis that started in the second half of the 70's and the following changes of labour market have made less secure the correspondence between city and immigration. Since the 80's the trends of the territorial settlements started to change; while Italy was becoming an immigration country, the settlement processes become less predictable and counter-urbanization and urban diffusion phenomena began. In this deeply change, it is useful to highlight the new spatial distribution of immigrant population and which territorial areas have been most affected by their presence. Over the last two decades, between 1991 and 2010, this question has become particularly important in Italian case. We can assume that vocation of migration is still urban, but it is associated to the new socio-territorial configurations, as, for example, the periurban or neo-rural configurations, and to new processes of social segregation. The research tries to answer to this question."""

2012

Italian statisticians and demographers observed in XXth century that generally the trend to settle in the largest urban areas is leaded by individuals seeking to enhance their quality of life. Franco Alasia and Danilo Montaldi introduced in 1960 one of the first researches on Italian internal migrations recognizing that «migrations have an urban vocation». Researches made in other national contexts obtained the same conclusions. It is possible to conclude that migrations have an urban vocation in an increasing intensification period of industrialization.

Journal of Historical Sociology, 1997