Alexandra Sandu (p), Katy Huxley, Robert French

Petra Staufer-Steinnocher (withdrawn)

This study investigates potential geographical variations in associations between socioeconomic factors and deprivation measures, across Wales. The key research question is: How do various socioeconomic, family, neighbourhood (area), and school factors relate to and interact with pupil academic performance across local (Lower Layer Super Output Areas - LSOAs) and regional (Local Authorities - LAs) contexts within Wales?

The study examines various socioeconomic variables, including household employment status, parental occupation as a proxy for income, household deprivation levels, free school meal eligibility as a proxy for pupils’ socio-economic status, special education needs (SEN), and ethnicity. Family characteristics are centred around family structure, while area deprivation is assessed using the Welsh Index of Multiple Deprivation (WIMD). School-related variables encompass the number of pupils as an indicator of school size and the pupil-teacher ratio. The primary focus is on pupil attainment, specifically Key Stage 4 results. Indeed, in addition to exploring traditional binary indicators currently prevalent in education data, this study contemplates the potential advantages of incorporating richer continuous measures for socioeconomic status.

Therefore, the analysis focuses on geographic variability across LSOAs and LAs in Wales. The research employs Geographically Weighted Regression (GWR) to account for spatial heterogeneity and assess how the relationships between predictor variables and pupil academic attainment vary across locations. The results highlight geographical inequalities and provide insight into which factors exhibit the greatest local/regional variation in terms of associations with pupil attainment.

Understanding these localised patterns has important policy and practical implications in terms of resource allocation, and strategies to address disparities. The findings will be informative for education leaders and policymakers focused on improving equity in pupils’ opportunities and outcomes across varying socioeconomic and regional/local contexts. Indeed, by using geographical lens, this study aims to support localised decision-making in the Welsh education system based on the variation of the diverse factors analysed across the local/regional settings.

Kévin Fourrey (p), Camille Regnier, Capucine Chapel

Alexandra Sandu

This article investigates the impact of new social housing developments on economic and social factors within localities in France. The primary focus is on the effect on real estate transaction prices, but the study also explores the impact on other factors such as the provision of public services and the socio-economic composition of the population. An in-depth examination will be carried out to grasp the intricacies across various regions of France and to better understand the contextual variations in the impact of social housing. The study utilizes comprehensive administrative databases containing real estate transactions in France from 2010 to 2022. This timeframe enables the study to capture long-term trends and variations in the housing market and associated socio-economic factors. To ensures robust and reliable empirical findings, the empirical analysis employs state-of-the-art difference-in-differences methods available in the literature.

The analysis will aim to determine if the effects can vary in heterogeneous economic contexts. Indeed, in a context of high land pressure, real estate inflation can be particularly strong. To some extent, the production of social housing fits into a perspective of regulating real estate prices: the aim is to build them, especially in sectors deficient according to the law, to meet demand without excluding the most modest. On the contrary, in areas where land pressure is lower and struggles to attract households, the production of social housing can lead to the renovation of neighborhoods and a modification of its population, causing a new dynamic on demand and prices. Thus, the study contributes to the broader discourse on urban development and housing policies, offering insights that can inform evidence-based decision-making. Understanding how social housing initiatives influence not only property prices but also public services and community demographics is crucial for policymakers and urban planners.

The comprehensive analysis of diverse outcomes across the entire French territory using the new DiD methods renders this study a valuable addition to the literature on housing and local development in the French context.

Oliver-Valentin Dinter (p), Abdelillah Hamdouch, Corneliu Iatu

Kévin Fourrey

The transition from the planned socialist economy to the liberal market economy has determined numerous changes into the countries that were part of the former Eastern Bloc in Europe. As they previously followed similar principles in all of the areas of the society, they have undergone transformations which led to different patterns of development as a result of the action of multiple factors.
Suburbanisation makes no exception to the rule. As socialist cities have become oversatured, the prerequisites of development could only be met in their peri-urban areas, which held enough land, mostly agricultural, to host the new residential, industrial and commercial expansion.
While the peri-urban development has taken mostly unsustainable forms due to the loose planning rules in these countries, leading to inequal access to basic facilities such as health, transport, education or even utilities infrastructure, this paper aims to identify the factors that have determined socio-spatial inequalities in two study cases from two different post-socialist states: Iași (Romania) and Lublin (Poland). Therefore, we will try to decipher the spatial patterns of development in both cities using population and built-up area rasters provided by the Joint Research Center of the European Comission. Our statistical analysis will include several variables such as the proximity to city or to different amenities, environmental conditions or local authorities decisions that will be able to elucidate the inequal development of the built environment. Moreover, it will showcase the main differences in this respect between the two cities and observe how the national and local context played their role into this process.
The results of this study will open the way on the reflection if these inequalities may represent a result of the differences in the planning approach and also about how to minimise these inequalities by envisioning policies that may contribute to this goal.