Gated communities are a social ill in Santiago? Do you agree?

/ˌɡeɪ.tɪd kəˈmjuː.nə.ti/

Ale: Gated Communities

Good morning, my name is Alexandra and he is Nicolas and we are going to talk about topic
number 10 which is Gated communities are a social ill in Santiago. Do you agree? We want
to start by saying that we agree with the statement because of several reasons that we will
have covered by the end of this presentation; but, first of all we’ll like to explain what gated
communities are and mention certain characteristics of them.

Ale: What are they?

According to Blakely and Snyder1: Gated communities are residential areas with restricted
access in which normally public spaces are privatised. They are security developments with
designated perimeters and controlled entrances that are completely intended to prevent
penetration by non-residents. They include new developments and older areas retrofitted with
gates and fences, and they are found from the inner cities to the exurbs and from the richest
neighbourhoods to the poorest.

Nico: How do they look?

In addition to what my classmate is saying, it is also important to note how they look. Since
gated communities are mostly private residential settlements whose residents cut themselves
off from the outside world, Frantz2 describes them as using a whole series of defensive
means, both of an architectural and landscaping nature. For instance, these closed
communities could be entirely protected by walls, fences or earth banks covered with bushes
and shrubs. Moreover, these communities either consist of single family or town houses,
owner occupied or rented apartments, or various housing unit that are referred to here as
mobile homes. There are also parks complete with cycle paths or footpaths, tennis courts and
golf courses. Frantz also states that gated communities, in their present form, originated in the
United States at the end of the 19th century and it was in the 1970s that they were to be found
in South America.

Nico: Where are they located?

At the same time, Rafiemanzelat3, locates gated communities in the US for the elites, in Latin
America for ethnicity, in Europe for vacation purposes, and in Asia and Africa for ethnic
differences and high rates of crime

Ale: Where are they located?

Well, Blakely and Snyder1 also review the spaces where we can find gated communities, but
specifically in the US. In their words, gated communities are more common in townhouse
and other higher-density developments, where units’ costs are often lower, but they are not
yet commonplace for the lower end of the income spectrum. Similarly, Salcedo and Torres4
argue that Chilean enclaves are not usually located in remote suburbs with low population
density, but in relatively urban sectors in which the inhabitants of the enclave face, -in
contrast to the US and separated only by a wall and a street - the poorer neighbourhoods of
the city.
Nico: Reasons
What is also worth highlighting is the reason why gated communities emerged. Frantz2 has
referred to:
first, the desire for security and fear: the desire of many citizens to feel safe;
second, the protection of the private sphere and the desire to remain undisturbed;
third, the possibility for residents in (gated) common interest developments to control the
stability of their neighbourhood and the value of their;
and fourth, the desire for identity and social homogeneity Distinguished by a certain
architectural style and also the facilities and amenities that are often found there lend the
community a particular character.

Ale: Reasons
I also read those ideas in Roitman’s5 research about the causes and consequences of gated
communities. She calls them subjective causes because they are considered as resulting from
individuals’ desires, interests, viewpoints and opportunities, but what is also considered is
aspirations for higher social status and social distinction within particular social groups.
In addition, she mentions structural causes which are divided into two themes. The first
relates to globalisation of the economy, which leads to growing urban social inequalities, the
processes of advancing social polarisation and an increase in foreign investments. The second
concerns the withdrawal of the state from the provision of basic services, which results in a
rise in urban violence and the privatisation of security.

Ale: Reasons
Nonetheless, Salcedo and Torres4 argue that even if different authors have presented many
reasons to choose a gated community as a place to live, the main reason is always security.
This desire for security would be even more intense in the case of Latin American gated
communities (Webster et al., 2002), usually surrounded by poverty and social problems.

Nico: Problems
In spite of how utopian gated communities may sound, Smets has listed several problems,
almost completely avoidable, that arise because of them. As an illustration, he says that those
who can afford to tend to withdraw from society by living in excluded enclaves such as gated
communities and move by private car between their home and specific institutions, shops,
workplaces, schools and entertainment areas. In this way, they secede from public contact
and exclude others from their socio-economic privileges. Thus, such excluded spaces differ
from open-minded spaces, which enable encounters that can lead to mutual respect, political
solidarity and civil discourse.

Ale: Chile’s case

According to Sabatini and Salcedo there are two models of social segregation concerning this
issue:
1. The first one is Santiago’s traditional segregation pattern:
It is upper-income groups who tend to concentrate in an area forming a geographic cone, with
its vertex in the historical centre and enlarging toward the periphery. On the other hand,
lower-income groups tend to live in vast agglomerations of poverty in other parts of the urban
periphery, while medium-income groups were less segregated and concentrated closer to the
urban core. The image of Santiago speaks for itself.

Nico: Chile’s Case

2. The second model is the dispersion of the elite
This spatial dispersion of the elite represents a rupture of Santiago’s traditional pattern of
segregation. Proliferation of gated communities outside the cone has been providing poor
classes with nearer shopping centres and modern office complexes. However, the authors
then concluded that this process represents an aggressive invasion and colonization of the
poor periphery. So, on the one hand, the scale of segregation is being reduced though the
construction of gated communities, promoting some forms of social integration and providing
advantages to poorer residents. On the other hand, it is important to point out this is a
functional and symbolic integration of poor families living near gated communities, and it is
not the ideal situation of complete integration.

Nico o Ale: Conclusion

As a conclusion, we will follow Roitman’s ideas that there have been noted positive effects,
like improvement of local economies and the creation of low-skilled jobs. However, she also
points out the negative effects, like fragmentation privatisation of urban space, undermine the
concepts of democracy and citizenship, and encourage social tensions and segregation.
So, we believe that even if there are as many positive as negative effects, the latter ones are
more severe.
Nico o Ale: Conclusion
Yes, this is because the integration is fundamental for the development of the country and the
type of integration that gated communities create is unequal. What we want to say with this is
that integration is not real because, at the end, poor people will continue to be part of the
lower socioeconomic status, just being nearer to richer people. Thus in the future, if gated
communities continue growing, they will have become a social ill in the sense that
segregation will still be present.