The Ghetto, the Hyperghetto and the Fragmentation of the World

Michel Agier

International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, 2009, vol. 33, issue 3, 854-857

Abstract: Abstract Reflecting on Loïc Wacquant's Urban Outcasts, my observations focus on two points: the ghetto and the hyperghetto. On the one hand, over and above the France–USA comparison, the text suggests that ‘the ghetto’ is a relative urban position, not one that establishes an identity. Within that framework, some French banlieues or Palestinian refugee camps are in a position of urban, social and political relegation that is well conveyed by the term ‘ghetto’ or ‘ghettoization’. On the other hand, if we are agreed that it is distance from the state that constitutes the ghetto, then transference of this notion of relegation to the global scale is a possible definition of ‘the hyperghetto’. Résumé À propos de Urban Outcasts (Parias urbains), ce commentaire s'attache à deux aspects: le ghetto et l'hyperghetto. D'une part, au‐delà de la comparaison entre la France et les États‐Unis, le texte présente le ghetto comme une position urbaine relative, et non identitaire. Dans ce cadre, certaines ‘banlieues’ françaises ou des camps de réfugiés palestiniens sont dans une position de relégation urbaine, sociale et politique qui est bien rendue par le concept de ghetto ou ‘ghetto‐isation’. D'autre part, si l'on convient que c'est la distance à l'État qui fait le ghetto, alors une mondialisation de cette figure de la relégation est une définition possible de l'hyperghetto.

Date: 2009
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