Spatial Inequality in Reykjavík

Essay from the year 2011 in the subject Urban and Regional Planning, grade: A, London School of Economics, course: Urban studies, language: English, abstract: ¿Mistakes were certainly made. The private banks failed, the supervisory system failed, the politics failed, the administration failed, the media failed, and the ideology of an unregulated free market utterly failed. This has called for a fundamental review of many elements of our society. In that respect, democracy, the rule of law and close international cooperation has been and will continue to be our strongest weapons¿ Prime Minister Jóhanna Sigurðardóttir reflecting on the Icelandic economic collapse, 12 April 2010.

The neoliberal experiment which was undertaken in Iceland, from the 1990s up to the financial collapse of 2008, generated unprecedented inequality not just in the country¿s income distribution (Olafsson & Kristjansdóttir 2010) but in the built environment as well. This paper outlines the spatial inequality that has emerged in the city of Reykjavík and its political, economic, cultural context. Different urban artifacts are examined through Sennett¿s concept of Open City, which gives us the instrument to value their spatial definition. Finally we ask ourselves whether the political revolution that followed the economic meltdown has produced signs of change in our city.