• 1.1: Types of comparison
• 1.2: The relationship of abstraction and empirical observation in this study
• 1.3: The relation of institutions, reinvestment, displacement and gentrification
• 2.1: The evolution of the rent gap
• 3.1: Homeowner protesting mortgage increases due to currency inflation
• 3.2: Diagram of state interventions in the housing sector
• 4.1: Right to Buy sales in London 1981–2014/2015
• 4.2: Two £1.5 million ex‐council houses: 163 and 165 Barnsbury Road
• 4.3: Median house prices (£) in Inner London, Islington and Barnsbury (MSOA Islington 017), 1995–2015
• 5.1: Milieux Protection Areas in Berlin (2016). Altogether close to 900 000 residents live in Milieux Protection Areas today
• 6.1: New structure on top of a historic building at Vladimirskyi Prospekt, St Petersburg in 2015
• 7.1: The causation of gentrification as both universal and particular

• 2.1: Classical forms of rent and gentrification
• 2.2: Decommodification and displacement
• 3.1: Trends in household tenures, London 1961–2016
• 3.2: Subsidies for housing and housing construction by types of subsidies in billions of DM, 1965–1988
• 3.3: Regulations on rent increases in sitting tenancies in Germany, 1971–2019
• 3.4: Regulations on rent increases in Berlin and Germany as of 2019
• 3.5: Estimated housing costs for a two‐bedroom flat in the centre of St Petersburg (2017)
• 3.6: Commodification gaps in the UK, Germany and Russia
• 4.1: Percentage of households by tenure in Barnsbury
• 4.2: Social class in Barnsbury based on Butler and Lees (2006) and UK Census 1992–2011
• 5.1: Renovated flats in Urban Renewal Areas in Prenzlauer Berg 1994–2001
• 5.2: Percentage of sitting and new tenancies after renovation in Urban Renewal Areas in Prenzlauer Berg 1995–2002
• 5.3: Number and percentage of individually owned apartments in Urban Renewal Areas in Prenzlauer Berg
• 5.4: New built housing units in the Urban Renewal Areas of Prenzlauer Berg
• 5.5: Subsidised housing units and commitment periods in the Urban Renewal Areas in Prenzlauer Berg
• 5.6: Characteristics of different segments of the housing sector in the Helmholtzplatz neighbourhood
• 6.1: Planned renovations in St Petersburg
• A.1: Housing units acquired through the use of compulsory purchase orders by the borough of Islington between 1973 and 1976 and sold after 1995 in the Barnsbury Ward
• B.1: Share of NS‐SeC Class 1 and 2 and tenure as a percent of all residents aged 16– 74 in UK Census Output Areas of Barnsbury in 2011

IJURR Studies in Urban and Social Change Book Series

The IJURR Studies in Urban and Social Change Book Series shares IJURR’s commitments to critical, global and politically relevant analyses of our urban worlds. Books in this series bring forward innovative theoretical approaches and present rigorous empirical work, deepening understandings of urbanisation processes, but also advancing critical insights in support of political action and change. The Book Series Editors appreciate the theoretically eclectic nature of the field of urban studies. It is a strength that we embrace and encourage. The editors are particularly interested in the following issues:

• Comparative urbanism
• Diversity, difference and neighbourhood change
• Environmental sustainability
• Financialisation and gentrification
• Governance and politics
• International migration
• Inequalities
• Urban and environmental movements

The series is explicitly interdisciplinary; the editors judge books by their con‐ tribution to the field of critical urban studies rather than according to dis‐ ciplinary origin. We are committed to publishing studies with themes and formats that reflect the many different voices and practices in the field of urban studies. Proposals may be submitted to editor in chief, Walter Nicholls (wnicholl@uci.edu), and further information about the series can be found at www.ijurr.org.

First and foremost, I wish to thank the five institutions and two particular individuals that were crucial for making this work possible. The Alexander von Humboldt foundation granted me a Feodor Lynen Stipend, which allowed me to dedicate my time to this project and to conduct empirical work abroad. This work would have been all but impossible without the patience and encouragement of my employer, the Leibniz Institute for Research on Society and Space (IRS), which granted me the time necessary to research and write this book and supported this detour from everyday business. Finally, and most importantly I wish to thank my two hosts in London and St Petersburg. Without the dedicated and continued support from Claire Colomb and the Bartlett School of Planning at the University College of London, the whole project would have never taken place. The same goes for Oleg Pachenkov and both the Centre for Independent Social Research (CISR) and the European University of St Petersburg. More than once, I was deeply impressed by the enthusiasm, reliability and imagination with which these magnificent colleagues supported my work. Both Claire and Oleg provided invaluable intellectual conversations and great company, which helped me along the cliffs of the project.

Numerous people assisted in the data collection and interviews or shaped the book by providing comments, ideas and background information in all three cities researched. I am very grateful to all of them. My debts here are too numerous to be listed in full. I extend thanks, in particular, to Michael Edwards, Michael Hebbert, Loretta Lees, Tim Butler, Chris Hamnett, Peter Williams, Alan Mace, Paul Watt, Duncan Bowie, Mike Raco, Jennifer Robinson, Hyun Bang Shin, Antoine Paccoud and all the other scholars who supported me in London.

My greatest thanks go also to Lilia Voronkova, Thomas Campbell, Dimitri Vorobyev, Irina Shirobokova, Katya Korableva and the other participants of the ‘Research Laboratory’, as well as to Anna Zhelnina and Konstantin Axënov, who all guided my way through St Petersburg. I am also grateful to Oleg Golubchikov for helpful comments on the matter of gentrification in Russia.

Berlin has been the place that has shaped my thinking about gentrification for a very long time. There have been so many people who have provided me with motivation, inspiration and information over the years that I don’t know how to count them all. Pars pro toto, I would like to thank a few people specifically here. First and foremost is Andrej Holm, who has been a friend and a political and intellectual companion for decades. The same goes for Margit Mayer who has crucially influenced my thinking about cities since I was a student. Over the years, a couple of people have been especially important for my studies on Prenzlauer Berg, both by providing information and supporting my work, and also by disagreeing and discussing things with me. These include Carola Handwerg, Michail Nelken, Theo Winters, Ullrich Lautenschläger, Jochen Hucke, Ulf Heitmann, Hartmut Häußermann, Karin Baumert, Wolfgang Kil, and Wilhelm Fehse and Bernd Holtfreter (who both passed way too early).

Grateful appreciation is also due to Talja Blokland, Michael Gentile and Slavomira Ferenčuhová, who read earlier versions of individual chapters. Finally, Willem van der Zwaag, Mary Beth Wilson and Kerstin Wegel have provided superb technical support.

Above all, I thank Anja and Juri for their love, support and patience, which have allowed this book to be written.