Abstract
Identifying disadvantaged urban areas represents one of the greatest technical and ethical challenges in contemporary urban planning. As spatial inequalities expand and become more tangible, the need for accurate delimitation methods becomes imperative for the proper allocation of public resources. However, the lack of methodological consensus means that each researcher applies their own procedures, which are sometimes impossible to replicate. This problem has received little attention in the specialist literature on the subject, despite the uncertainty it creates due to the possibility of obtaining divergent results. In order to reduce bias and arbitrariness, especially in relation to processes involving the distribution of public funds, this paper introduces the concept of “general tolerance,” referring to the degree of difference between methodologies used to delimit urban vulnerability. A mathematical procedure for quantifying the divergence between studies is presented, and its viability is tested by comparing four different methods applied in the same urban environment, specifically in the city of Valencia. As a result, the existence of divergences according to procedures is confirmed, and the magnitude of the differences is shown graphically and numerically.