Uneven development and spatial segregation: Case of İzmir (Karşıyaka)

Decomposition, social polarization and social exclusion are central concepts in today's urban debates resulting from spatial inequality. The aim of this study is to investigate how the socio-economic characteristics of the population living in Izmir (Karsiyaka) shape the environment and how this formation creates a differentiation in urban space. In this study, the debates on the spatial differentiation factor caused by unequal development in metropolitan cities are discussed comparatively at the neighborhood scale and critical theory is chosen as a framework in order to achieve this general research objective. In this general framework, the modern Marxist approach that focuses on space as a factor that produces and consumes social relations, and the humanist approach emphasizing the sense of place, drawing attention to human-place relations, are taken as a basis. In addition, the Works of Henri Lefebvre, David Harvey, Edward Soja on rediscovering space in modern Marxism and critical social theory are included. The negative effects of socio-economic inequality, has increased in a worrisome way in Turkey especially with the restructuring of the capitalist economy after 1970. This situation is seen as a threat to social integrity and stability. It is surprising that little is known about the spatial dimensions of the consequences of rising socio-economic inequality. Karsiyaka District, which is determined as the area of the study, draws attention as a place where inequalities and contradictions can be observed together on the one hand, with the texture that has started to be renewed with the closed settlements demanded by the middle-upper and upper class, on the other hand with the dilapidated historical buildings of the lower and middle income groups intensified by the effect of migration. In the research, a mixed research method was used, a questionnaire consisting of various structures was applied to 220 people from both sample areas and the data were analyzed with SPSS program. In addition, semi-structured in-depth interviews were conducted with 13 people in order to support the study findings, and the findings were revealed through content analysis supported by the MAXQDA program. The findings of the study showed that inequalities in the distribution of socio-economic resources in the study area increase spatial differentiation and that the distance between the social classes is an important problem for the sustainability and social welfare of the cities. Key Words: City, Unequal Development, Spatial differentiation, Neoliberalism, Space