Theorizing Gentrification as a Process of Racial Capitalism

Academics largely define gentrification based on changes in the class demographics of neighborhood residents from predominately low-income to middle-class. This ignores that gentrification always occurs in spaces defined by both class and race. In this article, I use the lens of racial capitalism to theorize gentrification as a racialized, profit-accumulating process, integrating the perspective that spaces are always racialized to class-centered theories. Using the prior literature on gentrification in the United States, I demonstrate how the concepts of value, valuation, and devaluation from racial capitalism explain where and how gentrification unfolds. Exposure to gentrification varies depending on a neighborhood's racial composition and the gentrification stakeholders involved, which contributes to racial differences in the scale and pace of change and the implications of those changes for the processes of displacement. Revising our understanding of gentrification to address the racialization of space helps resolve seemingly contradictory findings across qualitative and quantitative studies.

Automated summary

This article theorizes gentrification as a racialized, profit-accumulating process through the lens of racial capitalism, integrating the perspective that spaces are always racialized to class-centered theories. The author demonstrates how the concepts of value, valuation, and devaluation from racial capitalism explain where and how gentrification unfolds, with exposure to gentrification varying depending on a neighborhood's racial composition and the gentrification stakeholders involved. Revising our understanding of gentrification to address the racialization of space helps resolve seemingly contradictory findings across qualitative and quantitative studies.