Is it, or is not? The conceptualisation of gentrification and displacement and its political implications in the case of Berlin‐Prenzlauer Berg

Building on Peter Marcuse’s definition of displacement, this paper examines Berlin’s urban renewal policy since the 1990s and studies how different definitions of displacement support different policy alternatives. It argues that the conceptualisation of displacement is not merely an academic exercise, but has enormous political implications. We show how theoretical differences in the definition of displacement have been taken up by policy‐makers and used as justification for the withdrawal from ‘welfarist’ politics of market intervention to be replaced by advisory services to individual tenants. We argue that social scientists are partly responsible for this change and call for more critical intervention of scholars into public debates and a clearer specification of policy alternatives.