جامعه شناسی کاربردی (Jun 2023)
Urban Quality of Life in Isfahan: Priorities and Constructive Themes
Abstract
IntroductionThe construct of quality of life, known as the indicator of social development, is an analytical and key element in policy-making and policy examination in the public realm. This construct, initially used in the fields of health, has gradually entered other fields of study due to its characteristics, such as dynamism, multidimensionality, and different perceptions. It is essential to consider the construct of quality of life in a country like Iran from both internal and external dimensions in terms of research and policy-making. Concerning the internal dimension, this concept contributes to evaluating social policies, assessing decision-making at the micro and macro levels, improving service delivery, encouraging public participation, promoting human rights, distributing equitable resources, etc. The external dimensions of the necessity to consider the construct of the quality of life become more significant with the growing trend of globalization. In the era of globalization, different regions are competing to attract capital that is no longer limited to national borders. Improvement of the quality of life encourages many people and investors to live, work, and invest in an area. Therefore, it can be argued that achieving any dimensions of development is not possible without considering the construct of the quality of life in the current situation. If the lower urban quality of life is one of the outcomes of rapid urbanization, Isfahan will be no exception like other metropolises. It has faced the problems resulting from lower quality of life due to the expansion of urbanization. Thus, identifying the dimensions of urban quality of life and priorities of each of these dimensions from the perspective of the citizens of Isfahan seems necessary and requires extensive research for making policies and improving each dimension. This research was conducted to achieve this goal and sought to answer the following questions: Which dimension of urban quality of life has a higher priority and greater significance from the perspective of the residents of Isfahan? How do they perceive the themes, on which urban quality of life in Isfahan rests? Material & MethodsThis study followed a survey method and the statistical population included the citizens of Isfahan aged 15-65 years. 1806 people were studied by using multi-stage cluster sampling. Accordingly, the neighborhoods were randomly selected from 15 districts in Isfahan and the sample size for each of the districts was determined based on the population of each neighborhood. A researcher-made questionnaire provided the data collection tool. The data were collected through face-to-face interviews. The interviewer asked questions in the form of interviews and recorded the respondents’ opinions and answers. The questionnaire had both closed- and open-ended questions. Concerning the closed-ended questions on the quality of life, the citizens prioritized the 17 dimensions of urban quality of life. The findings were then analyzed by using descriptive statistics. The open-ended questions focused on the citizens' concerns about the dimensions of quality of life. Accordingly, the respondents were supposed to express three of their main concerns about each of the dimensions of urban quality of life and the interviewer wrote down the given answers in detail. The data obtained from the open-ended questions were analyzed via thematic analysis. This technique is based on inductive reasoning, enabling the researcher to achieve an analytical typology through data classification and input and output modeling. The thematic network of the citizens’ perceptions of the urban quality of life in Isfahan was developed by using the basic, organizing, and global themes. According to the above explanations, the first and second parts of the findings were based on the closed- and open-ended questions, respectively. Discussion of Results & ConclusionAs shown by the prioritization of the quality-of-life dimensions, the main concerns of Isfahan residents revolved around the 5 axes of employment and income, housing, health, safety and security, and climate quality. Thus, they could form the main axes of future policies concentrating on the urban quality of life. This was known as the well-being dimension of quality of life based on cluster analysis. It is interesting to note the priorities of the quantitative (income and housing) to qualitative (health, safety and security, and climate quality) dimensions among the components of this group. Hence, it could be concluded that the quantitative dimensions of urban quality of life, as well as well-being, had the highest importance in Isfahan.The findings highlighted the 3 global themes of urban threats, arrangements, and desirability related to the constructive themes of urban quality of life in Isfahan. Threats were those themes that threatened Isfahan in achieving a high quality of life and included water crisis, diseases, pollution, dense and high-rise buildings, overcrowding, industrial hazards, immigration, cultural anomalies, traffic, occupational and income risks, inefficient management, and decline of local culture and cultural heritage. As it turned out, the scope of these threats was wide and dominated all the 5 dimensions although the most concern was related to the dimension of well-being. Urban arrangements included those policies that citizens considered necessary to achieve a high quality of life, such as encouraging tourism, strengthening cultural customs, renovating, and facilitating ownership and provision of housing. Finally, the city was desired to be clean, beautiful and eye-catching, bright, and safe and secure. Such a city could have safe and smooth streets and paths, a cheap, clean, uncrowded, regular, and modern transport fleet, a safe urban infrastructure, neighborhood facilities, and warm and polite social interactions. Therefore, many of the components, in which the citizens were interested, belonged to the civil dimensions and few themes belonged to other dimensions on a neighborhood scale.Ultimately, inspired by some experiences, such as the Monitoring System of the Urban Quality of Life developed by the Porto City Council since 2002, this study formed the basis of further research with the aim of identifying the dimensions of quality of life and its constructive components from the perspective of citizens in general, examining the urban quality of life in Isfahan, evaluating the individual quality of life in a residential area, and assessing the level of satisfaction with individual quality of life. Of the goals of this monitoring can be objective and subjective periodic assessments for evolutionary and comparative studies.
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