Social Polarization and Socio-spatial Structure of Metropolitan Areas:

Bibliographic Information

Other Title
  • 社会階層分極化と都市圏の空間構造
  • A Comparative Analysis of Income Inequality in Tokyo, Osaka and Nagoya
  • 三大都市圏における所得格差の比較分析

Abstract

The aim of this research is to investigate, from the viewpoint of urban geography, the way in which the differences in household income are spatially distributed and how they have developed over a certain period of time in the three largest metropolitan areas in Japan, Tokyo, Osaka and Nagoya.In recent years, concern has been growing in Japan over expanding socio-economic disparity both intra-regional and inter-regional.Is it true that social polarization is an unavoidable phenomenon for such a global city as Tokyo? If so, how shall the polarization that we face today affect the overall socio-spatial structure of urban areas? To answer these questions this research picks up the three different years of 1983, 1993 and 2003 as significant reference points and analyzes how the polarization developed over the twenty years in the three areas and how different the changes were.<BR>Before conducting a statistical analysis, we first show that we use “The Annual Income of the Household” from “The Housing and Land Survey of Japan” as a chief data for our research.We also propose a methodically new and effective approach in which a quintile of equivalent income is calculated for every 10 kilometers range of distance divided by concentric circles.Then another important suggestion concerning methodology is made that a sharp distinction should be made between intra-regional income inequality and inter-regional income inequality, two concepts very often employed in an ambiguous way-sociologists tend to emphasize polarization in a hierarchy while geographers have an exclusive interest in the polarization that occurs between regions.In actual cities, however, as our analysis will show, these two phenomena appear simultaneously and in rather complicated ways.<BR>Our analysis confirms the existence of a widening household income disparity in all areas and then points out a remarkable phenomenon found in the Tokyo metropolitan area: although high-income households were previously concentrated in the suburbs, an extremely steep rise in income level (and consequently a growing income gap) has been happening in the center of Tokyo.Also, we reveal that the pattern of income distribution varies between the three areas, reflecting the size and the regional features of each city.

Journal

Citations (6)*help

See more

Related Projects

See more

Details

  • CRID
    1390282680372831744
  • NII Article ID
    130004101475
  • DOI
    10.5637/jpasurban1983.2007.5
  • ISSN
    18844839
    13414585
  • Data Source
    • JaLC
    • Crossref
    • CiNii Articles
    • KAKEN
  • Abstract License Flag
    Disallowed

Report a problem

Back to top