Essays

Essays

Navigating Jefes Fantasmas in New York City’s Urban Platform Economy

Jackson Todd - 3 March 2023

How has the “platform economy” altered urban life, infrastructure, and labor? Jackson Todd examines New York City’s...

Essays

Visualizing “Superdiversity” in New York City

H. Jacob Carlson - 8 November 2022

A new set of visualization and mapping tools focused on “superdiversity” shows the complexity and intersectionality...

Essays

The Emergence of Ecological Thinking in the City

Charles-François Mathis & translated by Oliver Waine - 27 September 2022

What place does ecological thinking have in the field of urban planning? In describing the use of vegetation in...

Essays

New Tourism Geographies and the Politics of Tourist Taxation

Elizabeth Strom - 7 June 2022

The changing geography of urban tourism has led to new forms of political contestation. How hotel-tax revenues are...

Essays

Before Redlining and Beyond

Alex B. Hill - 2 November 2021

There is a larger story of spatial racism in cities before and beyond redlining. Spatial racism was not limited to...

Essays

Un movimiento global por el derecho a la vivienda frente a la financiarización

Jaime Jover - 7 September 2021

La financiarización permite a las clases altas transnacionales acumular capital a través de la tierra, aumentando la...

Essays

Teacher Unionism and the Bargain for the Common Good

Claire Cahen - 6 July 2021

Rank-and-file teachers across the United States challenge their unions to embrace social democratic ideals, and...

Essays

We Have Been Here Before: Crisis, Response, and the Stasis of Urban Policy

Robert W. Lake - 29 June 2021

The disruptions produced by the global pandemic have spawned predictions of sweeping change that are unlikely to...

Essays

A Global Right-to-Housing Movement Versus Financialization

Jaime Jover - 23 June 2021

Financialization enables a wealthy transnational class to accumulate capital through land, enhances inequalities...

Essays

What Is Land?

Sai Balakrishnan & Mattijs van Maasakkers - 1 June 2021

Market-oriented land-use instruments presume that is possible to delink development or pollution rights from a...

Essays

Fablabs in Africa: Digital Innovation for Sustainable Cities?

Armelle Choplin & Martin Lozivit & translated by Oliver Waine - 16 April 2021

In a context where “smart cities” are being promoted in urban projects in Africa, Armelle Choplin and Martin Lozivit...

Essays

The House is Ours: How Moms 4 Housing Challenged the Private-Property Paradigm

Lauren Everett - 6 October 2020

In the midst of a global housing affordability crisis that has been heightened by the Covid‑19 pandemic, it is time...

Essays

Shelters for Profit, Not People: The Rise of Tax-Credit Investment in US Cities

Renee Tapp - 22 September 2020

Tax-credit investment in US cities provides tax havens for investors, and squanders taxpayer resources on...

Essays

Create, Don’t Destroy: Laying the Foundation for a Public Discourse on Racial Justice in Germany

Janina L. Selzer - 15 September 2020

A night of violence left Stuttgart, a usually peaceful German city, with many unanswered questions. While...

Essays

Community-Rooted Organizations: Enhanced Accountability and Capacity Building for Community Development

Camryn Smith & Danielle Spurlock & Aliyah Abdur-Rahman & Kay Jowers - 10 July 2020

Communities in Partnership, in Durham, North Carolina, uses a “community-rooted” approach to its work that leverages...

Essays

The Right to the City: An Emancipating Concept?

Matthias Lecoq & translated by Oliver Waine - 3 July 2020

The radical approach formulated by Henri Lefebvre in 1968 criticized the failure to include inhabitants in the...

Essays

Consent-Based Social Dancing Spaces and the Right to the City

Rebecca Krisel - 30 June 2020

Consent-based programs in social dancing venues in New York City are an initial step in supporting social dancing...

Essays

Reflections on Retooling for the Covid‑19 Pandemic

Nichola Lowe & Tara Vinodrai - 19 June 2020

Factories are adapting to the new conditions and needs the coronavirus has introduced by retooling production lines...

Essays

Homeless Theory and Research Collaboration: A Tribute to Nikita Price

Eric Goldfischer & Odilka Santiago - 9 June 2020

At a time when too many people are dying, Eric Goldfischer and Odilka Santiago remember Nikita Price of Picture the...

Essays

Sentinel Territories: A New Concept for Looking at Environmental Change

David Blanchon & Frédéric Keck & François-Michel Le Tourneau & Stéphane Tonnelat & Adriana Zuniga-Teran - 8 May 2020

In this essay, the authors develop the concept of “sentinel territories,” or environments where humans can perceive...

Essays

Educating Tenants: A Historic Remit of Social Housing

Danièle Voldman & translated by Oliver Waine - 17 April 2020

In France, the professions of social worker and concierge both emerged in the early 20th century, and both...

Essays

When Measurement Matters: Displacement, Gentrification, Residential Mobility

H. Jacob Carlson - 14 April 2020

Scholarly studies of displacement resulting from gentrification are inconsistent in what they measure, and omit...

Essays

The New Suburban Secession: A Postfascist Turn in Atlanta’s Cityhood Movement

Coleman Allums & Scott Markley - 10 March 2020

In this essay, Coleman Allums and Scott Markley analyze a suburban secessionist movement in Atlanta, Georgia. They...

Essays

New York Tech Dossier: Insecure Frontier Jobs? Staying Relevant in New York’s Tech Ecosystem

Max Papadantonakis - 21 January 2020

“Frontier” jobs in digital technologies promise lucrative career paths, but Max Papadantonakis’s research suggests...

Essays

New York Tech Dossier: The Declining Significance of Proximity in Venture Capital Investments

Joanna Dressel - 14 January 2020

Venture capital investment in New York City has increased over the last decade, contributing to the development of...

Essays

New York Tech Dossier: “Innovation Districts” in New York: Contentious Geographies of Growth

Sharon Zukin - 7 January 2020

Sharon Zukin analyzes how city government in New York has supported concentrations of tech firms—“innovation...

Essays

Poverty as a Social Stigma

Axelle Brodiez-Dolino & translated by Oliver Waine - 13 December 2019

The distinction between the “deserving” and “undeserving” poor is deeply entrenched, and representations of poverty...

Essays

From non-planning to cutting-edge policy: the transformation of waste management in Boston since the 1980s

Lily Baum Pollans - 11 June 2019

Recycling and composting are hot topics. Lily Baum Pollans argues that Boston’s changing approach to waste...

Essays

Urban Renewal in the USA: A Neoliberal Policy?

Thomas Kirszbaum & translated by Oliver Waine - 3 May 2019

By allowing demolitions and evictions in well-located working-class neighborhoods, urban renewal is sometimes...

Essays

As NYC (Again) Considers Comprehensive Planning, History Offers Insight

K. C. Alvey - 12 February 2019

Comprehensive planning can be a progressive governance tool, helping leaders keep broad principles like equity and...

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