Regionalisation process and the pattern of socio-residential specialisation between the crisis of the productive and redistributive spheres in the regional assemblage of Milan

The Milanese urban region can be understood as a trans-scalar assemblage, composed not only of the diverse territories within it and the materialities and individuals present there. It is also shaped by regulatory frameworks, such as administrative boundaries, resource allocation choices, the effects of the 2008 crisis on the population’s income, and the related spending review reforms. This paper explores the mechanisms and patterns of unequal accumulation of capital, both private and public, driven by the process of socio-residential specialisation taking place in the Milanese assemblage at the intersection between the neighbourhood effects generated by the overlap between regionalised residential geographies and the stability of municipal boundaries and the advent of the 2008 economic crisis, which acted on both productive and redistributive spheres. What emerges is a process of progressive socio-economic specialisation and segregation of the territories that make up the urban region.