Introduction

This chapter explores the implications for social cohesion arising from the recent increase in the number of gated communities in England, focusing on their impact both for residents and for those outside the gates. Starting with perceptions and definitions of gated communities, the chapter goes on to outline the academic and policy debates about these residential developments. It then examines their implications for social cohesion among individual residents within gated communities, and for cohesion in areas within which gated communities are situated, drawing on findings from recent empirical studies. The chapter concludes by discussing the implications of gated communities for cohesion at the national scale.

The term ‘gated community’ has been imported from the US, where developers and sellers of this type of housing emphasise its community aspects, conjuring up an image of a socially cohesive group of residents living in a geographical neighbourhood with welldefined boundaries to enhance secure feelings of community identity and belonging. In both the US and in England these developments have two equally important characteristics – physical and legal – but, as we shall see, ‘community’ is not an essential feature. In physical terms, a gated community is a walled or fenced housing development to which public access is restricted and often guarded using CCTV and/or security personnel. These developments inevitably reduce the public realm, defined as ‘the space between and surrounding buildings and open spaces that are accessible to the public’ (Planning Advisory Service, 2007). It is therefore not surprising that concerns about gated communities consistently emerged from interviews with local planning officers in England (Atkinson et al, 2003). The concept of permeability is a central principle of planning and urban design; urban sustainability and hence social cohesion depend on the free movement of people around urban space. Nor does a built form obviously designed to exclude, described by one planner as ‘“sod-off” architecture’ (Atkinson et al, 2003), sit comfortably with the ideal of inclusiveness in planning and design: ‘You should not underestimate the symbolism of the physical … [t]he physical fabric is testimony to separateness’ (local authority planning officer, quoted in Manzi and Smith-Bowers, 2005, p 352).

All gated communities have a legal framework designed to ensure that residents are involved in managing and taking responsibility for the privatised space, internal roads and any facilities within its physical boundaries.