ABSTRACT
Cities today are characterized by increasing ethnic and cultural diversity and are said to be multicultural (Sandercock 1998, 2003; Rogers 2000). This raises new questions about how to maintain social cohesion in multicultural cities. New groups in the city challenge previous spatial practices, and identifications with city and nation, thereby creating discomfort and unease among other groups of urban residents. Central to debates in multicultural cities, therefore, are questions about what aspects of difference are considered acceptable and who gets to decide what forms of difference become legitimate. In the name of multiculturalism, local and national state agencies have taken a role in regulating difference by introducing and legitimating various policies and other forms of intervention aimed at managing difference in cities. The multicultural city has become a frame for politics around questions of difference, neighbourhood identity, social inclusion and urban (re)development. This chapter explores some of these issues in relation to what is often seen as a ‘non-cosmopolitan’, but multiethnic, neighbourhood in Amsterdam: the Bijlmermeer.
