This research is part of the international Urbex research project and focuses on the spatial patterns of social exclusion and integration in two relatively poor neighbourhoods in Naples.

• The process of social exclusion in Naples is characterised by scarcity of social services, the role of the family of origin in providing support, and temporary and unstable jobs which do not solve the unemployment syndrome but do offer some form of survival.
• The degree of poverty and the risk of exclusion do not depend only on the characteristics of the labour market. Other variables, particularly the pattern of settlement, play a key role as well.
• The process of replacement in central districts and the consequent move to suburban and outlying districts by weaker subjects have not resulted in the creation of ghetto districts. Rather than any striking phenomenon of territorial concentration in Naples, there is instead a general distribution of 'scattered areas' in which trouble spots and ghetto risks may be found.
• The process of social exclusion is not an irreversible trend, but merely the effect of a combination of economic and social disadvantages as well as of town planning decisions and institutional negligence.

Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences, University of Amsterdam
Amsterdam
The Netherlands
http://www.fmg.uva.nl/english/home.cfm
Prof. Dr. Sako Musterd, tel. +31 20 5254062

01/11/2001

Morlicchio, E.

research

Urban Policy

Social inclusion & integration