ABSTRACT
At the start of this book it was argued that cities are characterized by heterogeneity. This heterogeneity is not, however, a simple ‘given’ in the analysis of this book. It arises out of the ways in which cities bring people, things and activities together, enabling them to mix and meet (or not). But it isn’t as simple as that either. For cities are also characterized by the relative homogeneity of certain spaces within them in comparison with other spaces. For this reason, the book has made much of the differentiation of spaces within the city, from the inner city to the suburb, whether in Istanbul, São Paulo or New York. Cities seem to have contradictory attributes: on the one hand their heterogeneity and, on the other, the apparent homogeneity of specific places or areas within them. Instead of thinking of this contradiction as an insoluble problem or a logical flaw, however, we have tended to see this tension between heterogeneity (or difference) and homogeneity (or community) as a product of the ways in which cities bring different things, people and activities together, or keep them apart.
