Socio-economic residential differentiation in post-socialist Tallinn

It is widely agreed that residentialdifferentiation has increased in Central andEastern European cities since the collapse ofcommunism. This article analyses the pattern ofsocio-economic residential differentiation inTallinn, the capital of Estonia, and shows thatby 1999 Tallinn's eight city districts had notyet been divided into rich or poor areas. Thepolarisation related to housing quality, asdiscovered within the more rapidly developingdistricts, suggests the development of pocketsof wealth and poverty within an otherwise mixedsocio-spatial structure. The article questionsthe straightforward connection often assumedbetween residential mobility and increasingresidential differentiation in post-socialistcities. The Tallinn case shows, first, thatmobility was low in the 1990s, and second, thatall changes of a place of residence –especially those made by middle-income groups –did not increase residentialdifferentiation.