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City Matters literature summary
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City matters literature summary, course taught at the University of Groningen.
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City Matters (readings)WEEK 1
The Just City (Fainstein)
Cities in the developing world, with large economic surpluses:
<1950’s positivism: lack of normativity in science empirical analysis
(demographic & physical characteristics), supported an unjust status quo
>1960’s space consists of social relations more focus on the spatial
disadvantages in poorer neighbourhoods (often: state programmes for
highways/urban renewal, displacing poorer communities)
Lefebvre: the right to the city, the right to participate in the creation of the city.
Harvey & Castells: Marxists: move to a more normative geography. Does use
justice= sense of injustice is a motivator for social change; thus, we cannot do
without it
1990’s: justice is used more explicitly by scholars
o Rawls
Theory of justice
Difference principle: policies should not only improve the
situation of those better off, when doing so is in the
advantage of the less fortunate
o Justice as bakermat for urban policies reaction to neolibarlism; growing
inequality and exclusion
Which had led to uneven distribution of resources by markets
Helping the poor means distorting the market
Efficiency= evaluation of public policy
How to pursue social justice in the city
Communicative theory/deliberative approach (democracy= process)
o Listen to stories, different viewpoints
o Consensus (democracy), no groups interests dominate (no privileged
hierarchy)
o Critics:
Irresolvable conflicts of interests; democracy?
Democracy can lead to exclusionary practices
Representatives of the poor might be co-opted or manipulated
Planners have little independent power
Diversity
o Critique Rawls/liberal democracy= undermines the ‘groups’; class, gender,
cultural, familial relationships (too much focus on the individual)
Whilst liberal democracies enforce and perpetuate inequality,
dissolution of the system would not mean greater equality (as
there is still difference in race, gender, etc.)
o Diversity= strangers meeting each other and coming together
,
However: mixed housing does not work, one prefers to live next to
someone that is familiar
Equity (outcome)
o Measures benefiting marginalized and disadvantaged groups and
communities
Equity vs. diversity vs. democracy = tension
WEEK 2
Transformation of Urban Governance (Harvey)
- City making is both product and condition of ongoing social processes of
transformation in the most recent phase of capitalist development
- Entrepreneurialism (1970s/1980s)
o How to improve economic development?
Grants, free loans
o Why?
Deindustrialization, market rationality, unemployment
Inter-urban competition; zero-sum?
Reduction of spatial barriers (transport costs) have
increased inter-urban competition
o Capital is highly mobile, thus: increased focus on
attracting economic activity by providing firms with
advantages (tax-breaks, job markets, etc.)
o This leads to: instability & volatility for urban centres
- Conceptual issues
o Is a city an active agent in economic development?
Spatial form of a city has effect of how consumption, exchange &
production is organized
Institutional arrangements
Entrepreneurialism public-private partnerships
o Speculative in design + execution, risks are
oftentimes carried by gov.
o Oftentimes place-specific projects: indirect effects for
the urban region surrounding it
- Alternative strategies of urban governance (in entrepreneurialism)
o Exploitation of advantages for the production of goods and services
(location or resource based)
o Consumption (tourism, festivals, etc.)
o Acquiring command functions in high finance, gov., info gathering or
processing (media)
o Redistribution through central government
Health, education, military spin-offs
- Macro-economic implications of inter-urban competition
o From locality to a much more open and market based form of
accumulation
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