In 1998, around 15% of the population lived in more communal home association settings. Of these about 8 million people lived in gated communities. Gated communities have expanded and are commonplace, fences, gates, walls, and armed security personnel.

Today, about 40% of new homes in California are behind walls along with states like Florida and Texas.

Globally, gated communities can be seen as complex systems driven by somewhat different motives and behaviors. They have something in common though. They separate us and them, for better or worse. They contain or retain values and barricade others toward that end.

You don’t have to be super rich these days to live in a gated community though most likely you will not have a golf course or tennis courts, etc. Increasingly gated communities apply to people from all socio-economic classes. They can exist anywhere and be any size - a few homes, a few dozen, or a complex the size of a small city. Most have a name and a geographic designation.

It is a division that has spread to the less wealthy as people attempt to form gated communities in the form of means such as street barricades for protection in poorer areas. Gates are add-ons in many apartment complexes. In cases, gated community residents, though not necessarily well-off, just want to be “safe” and with their own kind.

The problem is that the ultimate purpose of gated communities often extends beyond peace of mind for individuals as it channels the socially undesirable to another area and promotes promote social insulation and segregation.

When it comes to a healthy social fabric, there is also a question of the costs incurred by wider society as a result of reduced participation in the overall community and local government, reduced diversity, and the potential for crime to be displaced to other areas.