For many Istanbul stands as a symbol of success. It’s growing status as a ‘global city’ and a European Capital of Culture has attracted tourists, foreign investments, and massive development projects. Luis Gallo’s recent article in the Hürriyet Daily News provides a reminder that with development and prosperity there are rarely winners without losers.

[I]n the shadow of those skyscrapers, there is another Istanbul, a little-seen realm where the urban poor are coming face-to-face with the bulldozers clearing ground for the sparkling new city. The neighborhood of Sulukule, perhaps the world’s oldest Roma community, is already flattened, with just a few holdouts living amid the rubble.

This raises difficult questions as development continues.

With massive amounts of money, and the city’s international reputation, at stake, fierce debate is raging over the government’s “urban transformation” programs: They may be beautifying and enriching the city, but at what social cost?

Critics are quick to point to the increasing inequality that ‘success’ is bringing. Ozan Karaman, an urban-geography scholar from the University of Minnesota, explains

“Lack of representation will result in further marginalization of the urban poor and perhaps the emergence of a new type of poverty, in which the poor have no hope whatsoever for upward mobility and are in a state of permanent destitution.”

Tansel Korkmaz and Eda Ünlü-Yücesoy, professors of architectural design at Istanbul Bilgi University, argue that the government ignoring the plight of the poor is not simply an unexpected result of development. Instead, they claim that the government’s goal is to to hide the urban poor in 21st-century Istanbul.

“The following statement by Prime Minister Recep Erdoğan about the neighborhoods of the urban poor summarizes the essence of the official approach: ‘cancerous district[s] embedded within the city.’ Planning operations in Tarlabaşı, Fener-Balat and Sulukule are [intended] to move the urban poor to the outskirts of the city and to make available their inner-city locations for big construction companies for their fancy projects,” Korkmaz said.

Recently, in the rapidly changing Tophane neighborhood in Istanbul’s Beyoğlu district, dozens of people attacked a crowd attending an opening of art galleries. The  violence is a sign that frustration over being displaced in the name of gentrification has finally boiled over and is likely not a one time occurrence.

Experts say clashes between newcomers and longtime residents could become more frequent if people feel they have no say in the transformation of their neighborhoods and believe they must resort to violence in order to make their voices heard.

Even with the increasing tension, Ozan Karaman manages to hold onto hope while remaining critical of the current development approach.

“Urban redevelopment projects should be executed in collaboration with citizens and residents, not despite them. There is no need to re-invent the wheel; there are plenty of models of community-based development that have been successful since the 1970s.”