Middle Classes and Control of Common Spaces: Social Heterogenety and Change in Metropolitan Scale

Abstract

In this article the simultaneous effect of the process of transformation of the middle class and the change in scale of common spaces is explored. The case of Residencial San Felipe is analyzed for this objective. 45 interviews to neighbors were collected in order to explore the changes in the social ecology of the neighborhood. Also, a year of participant observation in common spaces in San Felipe (parks, sidewalks, parking-lots, and plazas) was conducted in order to map the users of these areas and their scale (neighborhood, district-, or metropolitan-scale). Though these transformations generate tense and sometimes conflictive situations, residents of San Felipe are able, in a high degree, to control behavior in these spaces. Yet, the ones who control more directly these spaces are the senior neighbors, who impose their particular point of view about how these spaces should be used.