SPATIAL STIGMATIZATION IN MONTREAL-NORTH: URBAN REVITALIZATION AND THE INVISIBILIZATION OF RACE
7 September 2021
A new article published in the 16th edition of Space Justice, by the TRYMONTREAL team.
Abstract
«
By addressing the concept of spatial stigmatization, this article intends to demonstrate
the dynamic nature of this process of marking and marginalization of certain urban
territories and their inhabitants. In a context such as Montréal-Nord which accumulates
social vulnerabilities and has a very high concentration of racialized populations, it is
necessary to question the link between race and space in the stigmatization process.
Our analysis, which is based on empirical data collected between 2016 and 2019,
highlights the role of public policies in the marginalization of the Northeast District. It
demonstrates in particular the denial of local governments in the face of sociospatial
inequalities and thus the intentional nature of the marginalization of racialized
populations. While racial discrimination remains an unthought-of issue in Québec’s
policies to fight inequality, it seems important to question the way in which urban
revitalization policy and forms of public action apply to a district of Montréal-Nord
borough after consultation with the inhabitants but without giving themselves the
means to integrate their demands or uses of the neighbourhood. Our hypothesis is
that the revitalization policy, thought of as participatory, essentially approaches the
neighbourhood as a neutral support on which to act, emptying the space of its lived
dimension and thus invisibilizing the relations of domination on the basis of its
stigmatization. In the case of Montréal-Nord, the revitalization of the neighbourhood
and the fight against its stigmatization by local policies contribute to normalizing the
practices of public space and to erasing the issue of racial and social inequalities in favour of developments that promote an ideal of integration of immigrant
communities. »
