Abstract:

Abstract Even though the cities constitute general allocation units in terms of historical and social conditions, they also reflect structures which incorporate differences. There had been changes in the content of city concept in parallel with socio-economic developments. This transformation period, which occurred as a result of socio-economic changes and human behavior, resulted in the emergence of urbanization concept. The period in which urbanization reached significance and took its final shape, starts with the Industrial Revolution. Even though urbanization itself is a consequence of social and economic changes, it is in interaction with political and social structures. Turkey was involved in the industrialization period later than Western countries and the main policy of political powers before 2nd World War was to keep the population in rural areas and prevent urbanization. However, in a globalizing world, it is not possible to prevent urbanization which grows in parallel to industrialization. In this context, it is possible to classify and review the urbanization process of Turkey as Low Urbanization Period (1923-1950), The Period of Urbanization Based on Rural Solutions (1950-1960), Urban Development Period (1960-1980) and Urban Transformation Period (1980 and later).

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