Introduction

In this chapter and Chapter Three we point to the changes that have taken place in class and ethnic structure and how these changes and the interactions between them have been particularly marked in East London. These changes could be regarded as a marker for the future, particularly in large metropolitan areas. They have also not occurred within a political and economic vacuum and we locate them in the context of London's recent re-making as a major financial services economy under conditions of neoliberal governance (Hackworth, 2007). This chapter is focused mainly on class change; Chapter Three looks at changes in ethnicity and how this has interacted with the changing class and housing tenure structure. We explore this interaction through an analysis of changes in the housing market in East London. We use this analysis of changes in social class and ethnicity in East London as the jumping-off point for our discussion in subsequent chapters of how our respondents have put their aspirations into practice. More often than not, ‘moving up’ has involved ‘moving out’ and this has been particularly governed by a wish to access ‘good’ (or perhaps more accurately, ‘popular’) schools.

In the mid-1960s, London's physical and human geography was neatly summarised by Peter Willmott and Michael Young (1973), as a ‘cross’ following its river basins (the Thames flowing west to east and the rivers Fleet and Wandle to the north and south respectively) and the railway lines which hugged the low-lying ground of the river valleys (see Figure 2.1).