Tenure structure and perceived social disorder in post-WWII suburban housing estates : A multi-level study with a representative sample of estates

Abstract

Studies on post-World War II housing estates have largely focused on problematic neighbourhoods, and there is a scarcity of literature on housing estates across their entire social scale. Moreover, there is insufficient evidence on the extent to which tenure structure differentiates estates from each other in terms of social disorder. Using a large cluster sample of Finnish estates representing a wide variety of estate neighbourhoods, we examined the implications of tenure structure in terms of social disadvantage and perceived social disorder. We also studied how social interaction and normative regulation mediate the impact of structural estate characteristics. We found that rental domination is associated with social disadvantage, which exposes residents to social disorder, in line with social disorganisation theory. Differences in normative regulation partly explain this association. In contrast, social interaction in the neighbourhood is not associated with the level of perceived social disorder. The theoretical and practical implications of the results are discussed.