The socio-spatial politics of urban sustainability transitions: Grassroots initiatives in gentrifying Peckham

This paper examines how grassroots sustainability initiatives take shape in a specific socio-economic context. It argues that such initiatives are best conceived of as exercises in material, sociocultural, and political-economic 'placemaking' which is especially evident in the gentrifying urban environment. A gentrification perspective highlights the ways in which initiatives are influenced by their local socio-economic milieux and, vice versa, can influence the socio-economic restructuring of their neighbourhoods. The paper draws on an ethnographic case study in the neighbourhood of Peckham, South London. It describes and analyses how overarching economic interests in neighbourhood development as well as culture, class, race, and other aspects of identity-simultaneously and interdependently-determine initiatives' emergence and evolution. It draws attention to the fact that the distribution of costs and benefits associated with sustainability initiatives is not 'neutral'. In doing so, it questions common, overly positive views of grassroots initiatives.