Abstract
The last couple of decades have seen gentrification described as a globalising, or even planetary, concept (e.g. Smith 2002; Atkinson and Bridge 2005, Harris 2008, Lees et al. 2015, 2016). Most of this discussion has been framed in relation to rural space, although there have been claims that the process of globalisation has led to the incorporation of rural spaces into processes of urban gentrification. As mentioned in Smith and Phillips (2018), such claims can be questioned both empirically and theoretically, and there have also been criticism about the theoretical and political consequences of applying the concept of gentrification globally (e.g. Maloutas 2012; Ghertner 2015). Drawing on comparative research involving the UK, USA, France and Japan, as well as a wider survey of studies of rural gentrification, this paper seeks to explore the extent to which rural gentrification as a phenomenon or as a concept may be seen to be undergoing processes of globalisation. After illustrating the global presence of studies of rural gentrification, the paper discusses the meanings of the term global and planetary employed within gentrification studies, before considering the way the rural and the local has been incorporated in conceptualisations of global and planetary gentrification by urban scholars. It highlights the use of critical realist distinctions between necessary and contingent relations prior to considering criticisms that have emerged within assemblage theory and associated alternative realist approaches such as agential realism (Barad 2012) and speculative realism (Bryant et al, 2011). The paper explores the extent to which such perspectives might be applied to understand the globalising presence of gentrification, exploring specific instances of rural gentrification in Japan, as well as France, the UK and the USA. The paper outlines the notion of 'genetic', 'relational'. 'individualising' and 'variation-finding' comparisons as ways of examining the global presence of gentrification in rural spaces. It concludes by evaluating the extent to which such notions can advance the study of gentrification beyond contemporary critical realist approaches to studying the global and the planetary and the criticisms of such approaches as advanced by critics such as Maloutas (2012) and Ghertner (215), as well as provide scope for the study in rural Japan and elsewhere.
