International Social Science Journal (Chinese Edition)

No.4, 2017

 

Poverty and urban inequality: the case of Mexico City metropolitan region (Abstract)

 

Alicia Ziccardi

 

In Latin American cities, and in particular in Mexican cities, poverty and inequality have been and still are very serious social problems. The unit of analysis of this study is one of the world’s megalopolises: Mexico City, a central space that articulates the national and the international economy, while still being the hub of the country’s economic, social, cultural, and political life. This large metropolis has modified its urban morphology in response to the requirements of the global economy, giving rise to a major metropolitan urban region, a sprawling megacity with blurred boundaries, a new urban region typical of the post-Fordism city, generating new territorial inequalities. This paper has been structured in three parts. The first section revisits the concepts of urban periphery, poverty, inequality, and residential segregation. The second part addresses the attributes of these new urban macro regions that enable certain segments of the local economy to articulate with the global economy. The third part attempts to exemplify and illustrate  how   these  demographic,   socio-economic, and territorial processes are expressed in Mexico City.