Choice of the Cases and Sampling

In accordance with the constructivist view on grounded theory method, the study consisted of two-stage sampling involving initial and theoretical sampling with both stages including purposive sampling design. The research was originally designed as a single case study of Leeds, UK. However as a consequence of the nature of pilot study analysis, the research expanded to include a deliberately contrasting case of Istanbul Turkey.

The overall research was informed by a total of 22 semi-structured interviews. Each interview is audio-recorded and were transcribed verbatim soon after the completion. As emphasised in constructing grounded theory by Charmaz (2014), the coding process was kept simple and consisted of two processes of initial and focused coding. In grounded theory, initial coding starts with being open to the meaning and theoretical possibilities of the data rather than applying pre-existing categories to the text. Throughout the initial coding certain questions, such as ‘what is this data a study of? What do the data suggest? What processes is at issue here?’, in order to understand the participants’ perspective and analyse the data

The City of Leeds demonstrated a great degree of appropriateness for the study due to its post-industrial city status. In Europe, England in the particular case of the present study, cities served a purpose before the industrialised economy movement. Leeds developed as a market town in the middle ages before becoming a co-ordination centre for manufacture of textiles. Leeds is

now the third largest and one of the fastest growing cities in the UK. It is located in the middle of the UK with a diverse population of 751,500, as of 2011 (Leeds Gov, 2015).

The focus of cities was the main purposes they had served for not only regional but also national economy. As a consequence of the shift from manufacturing to industrialisation, cities are being faced the challenge of differentiation and attracting investment thus competition. Before the industrialisation, Leeds was considered to be one of the major centres for textiles industry. Since then Leeds has been investing greatly on regenerating the city in an attempt to create and communicate a more positive image of the city, attract investment and visitors. In addition, mainly as a result of being a home to two major universities (Leeds Metropolitan University and University of Leeds), the city allowed for a non-monoculture population that enabled a broader context for the study.

The main rationale for the participant selection was to be a resident of Leeds. The participants were required to be 18 years of age or over due to ethical reasons and had no direct links to the researcher. The main challenge for the researcher was the definition of a “resident”. Indeed in general terms, a person who just had moved to an area and/or have been living in the same area since birth could be categorised as residents. However as the purpose of the study aims for an in-depth insight and gain understanding of the residents’ perceptions of where they live resonates a requirement for a

degree of time spent in the resident location. Therefore considering this, in the particular case of the present study the notion of residents included candidates who have been living in Leeds for a minimum of five years. This also provided the researcher a degree of history of information and enabled to gain insight on the environmental changes and the perspectives associated to those changes.

In consequence, the initial stage included three guiding interviews and the main inclusion criterion was that they had to be residents of Leeds, UK for a minimum of five years. The six LS postcode towns were used to identify the potential participants. In order to minimise biases and the researcher identified participants from residential areas and avoided shopping districts.

Based upon the findings from the initial stage, emerging concepts and properties were identified as well as subsequent research participants for the theoretical sampling process. The guiding principle of this stage was to gain further understanding and making sense of the emerging categories. Initial stage properties suggested by all of the participants was that living in an environment where there are people from different cultural backgrounds indicated a feeling of safety and a welcoming environment. Therefore the stage two of the study was designed to involve the addition of Istanbul, Turkey to the original proposal of Leeds in order to 1) explore the associations or differences in cultural backgrounds to the concepts of ‘safety’, ‘welcoming’ and ownership, 2) compare and contrast the meanings of the

key themes of the study in two different cultures. As a result the second stage consisted of further in-depth interviews with the residents of Leeds as well as Istanbul.

Istanbul was proved to be a valuable selection with its distinct culture and rich and diverse history. It is one of Europe’s most crowded and fastest growing cities. As a transcontinental city with a population of over 14 million, as of 2014 (Istanbul Gov, 2015) it is home to two continents of Asia and Europe, which makes it a unique city in the world. Both cities reveal cultural and geographical differences therefore in order to maintain the consistency of methodological concerns, the same purposive sampling design was maintained in both locations. In Istanbul, because the city is divided into two main regions as European and Asian side, the participants were included residents from both sides.

Throughout the 22 interviews, the researcher gave special attention to getting to know the individuals in order to gain depth of insight into their perspective and experiences with the city as well as the meanings they associated to being a resident in the selected cities. The participants were asked about how they would identify and describe a place. This was significant because it allowed the researcher to explore the participants’ perception of places, what elements do they count the most and reversely what elements within the city leave them with the most memorable expression.

After gaining an initial understanding of these elements, the participants were encouraged to discuss their negative or positive meaning associations when they were describing and identifying a place throughout the interviews. This provided insight and further probing into their relatedness, connection, association and disassociation with the city. Furthermore, participants were asked what it is that connects them to a place and what cues they look for in a residential place. This led the researcher to explore their ownership, belongingness and pride in where they live and whether they reflect, act upon, engage or represent these feelings.

Indeed there is the common problem with the use of and being limited to cases and their generalisability however Yin (2003) stresses that no matter how large or how many set of cases can deal with the issue of generalisability, the main issue is the notion of generalisation from one case to another. Specifically considering the nature of cities as “brands”, the main intention of the present study is to generate a theory that will enable to understand and systematically explain the interrelations of the key concepts informed by the literature review and now achieve a statistical theory of generalisation.