Case Studies  The Berlin Case Study: The Socially Integrative City.Wrangelkiez, Boxhagener Platz, Ostkreuz

2. The Policy of Neighbourhood Development in Berlin: “Socially Inclusive Urban Development”

2.1. Elements of „Socially Inclusive Urban Development“

Like in other European countries, the „modern“ forms of post-war urban regeneration in Germany have a 40-year–old record. During this brief history, regeneration policies underwent several stages of development up to today’s programme “Socially Integrative City”. These stages of development, each of them with their own set-up of funding and objectives introduced by the different state governments, partly overlap until today: urban renewal, rehabilitation, regeneration and revitalisation. The same pattern applies to Berlin.

Urban renewal was the first stage in the 60s and 70s of the 20^th century. In the western part of the divided city, it focused on the historical areas built before 1918. Formally, its procedures were regulated by federal law, which determined target areas for funding. Their development perspectives elaborated primarily the physical renewal of the infrastructure and the housing supply, both of which was supported by public funds. Whilst the first stage assisted large scale demolition and new buildings when economic pressure for restructuring was looming large, the next stage of Urban Rehabilitation focussed on rehabilitating the existent stock of housing and buildings. After the reunification of the city, this programme focused on the neglected areas in the city’s eastern part.

Both the large post-war estates of the public housing scheme areas of West Berlin as well as the large estates of East Berlin were predominantly built in the 70s and 80s. They were built until the 90s in order to eliminate housing shortage. However, soon their physical and urban design deficits became apparent, and in conjunction with decay and mismanagement, social disintegration occurred. In response to these trends, the Senate of Berlin supports the upgrading of their open spaces and their social-structural advancement as part of a wider strategy for a socially inclusive urban development.

Such mosaic of areas in physical, economic and social decline at the beginning of the 21^st century reminds us time and again, that cities do not primarily consist of buildings, but of social relations as well as functional cohesion. The economic and social developments have led to a situation where all cities contain neighbourhoods in which functional and social problems overlap in a complex way and give rise to a self-perpetuating negative location factor. To mitigate this cumulation of problems has become the task of city governments. The federal-state-programme “Socially Integrative City” and supporting programmes of the EU have made this new form of urban regeneration possible.

When mapping this more recent stage of urban regeneration policy, area definitions of the initial stages overlap and form “layers of policies”: Berlin has defined its most problematic areas both within the confines of its former urban renewal areas, as well as, for example, within the large housing estates. In 17 so-called Quartiersmanagement-Gebiete (Neighbourhood-Management-Areas), the regeneration process is now being initiated by a Neighbourhood Management procedure, whilst the 18^th area is supported within the programme Urban II.

The overlapping of these areas targeted both by traditional and current (national and European) regeneration policies demonstrates the direction in which urban regeneration in Germany is developing. Regeneration under the new “Socially inclusive Urban development” scheme means a continuation of Berlin’s approach to urban regeneration with the emphasis on

• the integration of a variety of approaches,
• the combination of city planning, housing policy, social and economic instruments and
• the linking of public, economic and private actors.

In Berlin, three different „programmes“ have been developed towards these ends:

• socially inclusive urban regeneration in 30 formally delineated urban renewal areas,
• the strategy for the advancement of 32 large housing estates of the public housing and 17 estates of the “complex housing construction” (from the former GDR)
• the programme “Socially Integrative City” in its narrower sense which started in spring 1999 with initially 15 and since autumn 2001 17 “Neighbourhood Management Areas” as defined by the resolution of the Berlin Senate and the area of the Community Initiative of the European Union, URBAN II.

“Socially Inclusive Urban Development”- the vision

The vision of a “Socially Inclusive Urban Development” is codified in the coalition agreements of the state governments of Berlin 1999. This model remained unchallenged in spite of dramatic cuts in the city government budget that also brought about a fundamental turn in urban development policy and a “withdrawal of the state” since 2002. On the one hand it reflects the self-perception of a “cooperative welfare state as partner of the citizens” as announced in the government declaration of the Berlin mayor and head of executive; on the other hand it enforces the German constitutional principle of creating equal living conditions by turning it into policy at the city-level.

To illustrate the specific Berlin approach of the „Social Urban Development“ and the resulting partnership models, the Neighbourhood Management approach and the URBAN II programme will be described in this case study. Both aim at developing local partnerships. While in the Neighbourhood Management, the federal-state-programme “Socially Integrative City” is implemented, the EU Community Initiative (CI) URBAN II is being implemented in the area around the “Ostkreuz”. Both are structurally similar, but different when it comes to details of the programming. In the following, we will first outline the main institutional features that form the basis of both programmes’ approach. Detailed illustrations will then illuminate three aspects of this steering approach: I) programming and organising the process of steering – based on the example of URBAN II, ii) the implementation within local fields of action – illustrated with examples from the Neighbourhood Management at Boxhagener Platz, iii) the element of residents’ activation and community empowerment – using the example of the Neighbourhood Fund and its implementation in the Wrangelkiez area.

Functioning and Organisational Structure

The core of this approach is the principle of decentralised policy coordination. In the Neighbourhood Management areas, “Neighbourhood Management teams” have been appointed to implement the neighbourhood development schemes; in the URBAN II area, an external programme management has been contracted. These agencies have been assigned per contract by the Senate Administration, and they have their office in the Berlin neighbourhoods. They are the central hubs within the governance network of the regeneration process. The local authorities (districts) treat these areas with priority. They also assign a responsible area coordinator to each team, as does the Senate Administration.[1] This allows for a concerted action across the borders of departments and administrations. (For a detailed description of the respective Senate and District competences, A1 in annex).

Some concrete local tasks of the teams are:

• Mobilising inhabitants and businesses to actively participate in the development process of their neighbourhood,
• Coordinating the neighbourhood, i.e. link different interest groups and local actors, establish cooperation between institutions, initiatives, businesses, housing societies, etc.;
• Assisting with the development of social, cultural and economic projects or those who deal with physical renewal (project initiation).

Steering and Controlling at the City State (Länder) Level

All questions of a principle nature concerning the areas are discussed at a monthly meeting (jour fixe) of all teams at the Senate Department of Urban Development. Invitations to these meetings go out to the 17 Neighbourhood Management teams and the local office of URBAN II as well as to other Senate departments, service-providers for employment programmes, the job centres, and academics and experts from the accompanying evaluation.

Meetings of an accompanying steering committee are being held at the level of the State Secretaries approximately two to three times a year. It gathers those Senate Departments involved in questions of the “Social Urban Development”. These are the Senate Departments of Urban Development; of Education, Youth and Sports; of Health, Welfare and Consumer Protection, and of Economics, Labour and Women. In this round, fundamental issues concerning the “Socially Integrative City” and the local neighbourhood development are discussed, especially reflecting on the complexity of underlying trends and the city-wide implications and looking for the solution of possible conflicts of aims.

Additionally, a cross-departmental committee „Socially Integrative City“ is planned at an expert level, to reinforce the broadening of the programme approach and the integration of additional actors from public and private domains with a corporate relevance.

The cooperation between the state level and the districts is stated in an administrative agreement for the personal and financial support of the programme. There are different local regulations for Urban II and the Neighbourhood Management. These will be exemplified in the following case studies.

Financing and Bringing together Funds (State/National Level/EU)

Socially oriented urban development policy in Germany is not just local policy, but multi-layered. It is established at several political-administrative levels, not only in the city state of Berlin. This can take a variety of forms. They also entail specific funding regimes including different shares of the European, the national, the city state and the district level.

The Neighbourhood management procedure and the projects resulting from it have been financed since 1999 by the federal-state-programme “The Socially Integrative City”. Until 2002, the federal state is paying 13.2 Mio. €. Additionally, from 2000 to 2006, funds amounting to 39.0 Mio. € (22.3 Mio until 2002) are provided by the “European Regional Development Fund” (ERDF) of the European Union (funding schemes “Urban and Local Infrastructures”) for the Neighbourhood Management areas in Berlin.

For the programmes of the federal government and the EU mentioned above, Berlin has to contribute the mandatory proportion of co-funding. Between 1999 and 2002, Berlin’s share amounted to about 39.5 Mio. €, of which 8.7 Mio. € account for the Neighbourhood Fund for the period of 2001 to 2003.

Funding 1999 – 2002

NB: Funds of programmes for the improvement of the open space (“WUM West” and “WUM Ost”) are not included in this listing.

As a Community Initiative of the EU, the programme URBAN II is also funded by European Regional Development Fund ERDF. The proportion of national co-funding amounts to 25% and is related to the respective projects of different funding schemes of the federal state and the city state. For the funding period 2000-2006, altogether 19.8 Mio. € are available here.

The financing models of the Neighbourhood management and Urban II schemes differ in terms of their budget periods. The Neighbourhood Management areas are allocated their resources on a yearly basis, whereas Urban II has a fixed budget 2000-2006.

Monitoring the Urban Space

In order to assess the performance of the Berlin Neighbourhood Management, a city monitoring system has been introduced at the level of the Senate Department of Urban Development. It combines quantitative aspects of assessing the programme areas as well as a city wide scale of comparison. The table in A2 summarises the different sets of indicators of which the city monitoring system is made up (See A2 in annex for details).

On the basis of the indicators, the statistical areas of Berlin were classified according to development types (i.e. clusters). In order to distinguish areas with similar attributes, a cluster analysis was used, a mathematical-statistical procedure that incorporates different area attributes2. As a result, nine area types were identified on the basis of the special evaluation of migration data within the period of 1994-1996, each of which have been formed by distinct social-spatial developments.3 (See A3 in annex for details).

The Sub-Areas and their specific Features     2.2 URBAN II as Partnership at Programme Level with Structured Procedures