Institutional Change through Innovation: The URBAN Community Initiative in Berlin, 1994–99

Reunification profoundly challenged the local government structure inherited from the Cold War period in Berlin. Yet this sudden socioeconomic and political change did not produce any immediate impact on institutional arrangements or policy instruments within the urban policy field. In this context, the implementation of the European Community Initiative URBAN, between 1994 and 1999, offered an opportunity to actors who were willing to challenge the existing balance of power to contest the legitimacy of preexisting interests and representations. The author argues that, in a context of competing interpretations of the issues raised by segregation processes which have left pockets of poverty in both parts of the city, the URBAN programme has managed to become an important driving force behind an underlying process of change. Its innovative approach to urban poverty and social exclusion exerted an impact on the parameters of this process of change, exacerbating existing political and organisational conflicts and challenging local networks, sources of legitimacy, and policy instruments.