Essays

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...

Essays

The Treatment of “North Africans” in 1960s Urban Renewal in France

Janoé Vulbeau & translated by Oliver Waine - 1 February 2019

While France’s 1960s urban renewal has been studied in terms of its effects on the working classes, its racial...

Essays

Solidarity Economics and Rights to the Contested City in Belfast

Brendan Murtagh - 19 December 2018

Is Lefebvre’s right to the city capable of extending the abstract meaning of formal “rights” to practical...

Essays

Organizing Against Projet Gentrification: Housing Activism in a White-Supremacist Landscape in Montreal

Pierce Nettling - 27 November 2018

Housing activists in Montreal and Quebec have successfully sought to secure tenant rights and social housing for...

Essays

Electricity in War-Torn Aleppo: A New Form of Urban Management

Youssef Diab & Abboud Hajjar & translated by Oliver Waine - 23 November 2018

In Syria, electricity is one of the sectors most adversely affected by the war. New means of electricity...

Essays

Migrants’ Occupation of Lycée Jean Quarré: The Refugee Cause and the Cause of a Neighborhood

Isabelle Coutant & translated by Oliver Waine - 16 November 2018

The flows of migrants seeking refuge in Europe since the summer of 2015 have led to temporary settlements—legal or...

Essays

Getting Night Lighting Right

Samuel Challéat & Dany Lapostolle & translated by Oliver Waine - 2 November 2018

Innovation in contemporary urban lighting has increasingly been driven by issues of sustainability. While...

Essays

The Making of a Progressive Mayor: James Kenney of Philadelphia

Richardson Dilworth - 17 October 2018

Philadelphia’s voters elected James Kenney Mayor in 2015 after he had served more than two decades as an at‑large...

Essays

Local Leadership and Global Goals: How City Sustainability Networks are Changing Progressive Policymaking

Emma French & Supraja Sudharsan & Jennifer Clark - 18 September 2018

While national governments often struggle to address global climate change, cities are in a better position to...

Essays

The Limits of Progressive Policymaking in US Cities

Richard Schragger - 11 September 2018

While many US cities appear to enjoy extensive powers—as evidenced by the progressive policies enacted by certain...

Essays

The Educational Fortunes of Children of Immigrants in France

Mathieu Ichou & translated by Oliver Waine - 6 July 2018

How can the attainment gap between children of immigrants and children of native-born parents be explained? While...

Essays

Far from the Ballot Box: The Political Exclusion of the Working Classes in France

Camille Peugny & translated by Oliver Waine - 4 July 2018

Following the French presidential and parliamentary elections of 2017, the question of equal access to the...

Essays

The Urban Heart of a Just Transition: How Cities Plan for Social Justice in Climate Action

Alexa Waud - 3 April 2018

Cities are often framed as sustainability saviors. Alexa Waud analyzes 20 climate action plans of cities that...

Essays

Looking Forward to 2020 While Looking Back: A Brief History of the US Census

Frank Donnelly - 27 February 2018

As preparations for the 2020 census are under way in the United States, Frank Donnelly looks back at how the census...

Essays

Institutional Roadblocks to Achieving Environmental Justice Through Public Participation: The Case of CSO Control in US Cities

Rebekah Breitzer - 24 January 2018

Rather than meaningfully involving representatives of environmental-justice communities in decisions about the...

Essays

Birdwatching in the City: A Case for Multispecies Tourism

Elizabeth Cherry & August Davidson-Onsgard & Lisa Jean Moore - 16 January 2018

This essay analyzes the growth of urban avitourism—wildlife tourism focused on birds—as an activity that drives...

Essays

Urban Shrinkage in France: An Invisible Issue?

Rémi Dormois & Sylvie Fol & translated by Oliver Waine - 13 September 2017

Although the phenomenon of urban shrinkage affects a significant number of French towns and cities, it is an issue...

Essays

The Happy Few and the Unhappy Many: Endangered Artists in Global Cities

Boris Grésillon & translated by John Barrett - 15 June 2017

While participating or having participated in reshaping urban spaces, artists seem to be increasingly driven away...

Essays

American Shrinking Cities May Not Need to Grow

Deborah E. Popper & Frank J. Popper - 25 April 2017

Successful cities are expected to continually grow, and when this doesn’t happen, city managers typically try to...

Essays

Urban Decline Is Not Natural

Jason Hackworth - 11 April 2017

Is urban decline inevitable for cities affected by deindustrialization? While many scholars espouse the idea that...

Essays

Counterpublic Spaces and Movement-Building

Oksana Mironova - 8 March 2017

To make themselves and their causes visible in traditional public arenas like streets and parks, social activists...

Essays

The Arts as Fundamental—and Fragile—in Community Life

Andrew Zitcer & Julie Hawkins & Neville Vakharia - 22 February 2017

Arts funding in America mirrors the inequality found in society more broadly. Yet amid persistent poverty and other...

Essays

This is Not How it Ends: Post-Election Immigration Organizing in the United States

Folasade K. Famakinwa - 7 December 2016

In response to a tense post-election moment in the US, the Metropolitics editorial committee has initiated...

Essays

Cracks Where the Light Gets in: Recent Legal Breakthroughs in Detention and Crimmigration in Canada

Petra Molnar & Stephanie J. Silverman - 7 December 2016

While the criminalization of immigrants has been pervasive—leading many to adopt the word “crimmigration”—that does...

Essays

Remaking Black Political Spaces for Black Liberation

Akira Drake Rodriguez - 1 December 2016

What are the political implications of the redistribution of the Black population in the US? Akira Drake Rodriguez...

Essays

Overcoming the “Scalar Stalemate” in Community Development

Evan Casper-Futterman - 14 October 2016

When urban practitioners undertake local projects, they are often working not only to achieve material gains in...

Essays

The Crisis of Geographical Imagination in Turkey

Luka Lucić - 21 June 2016

Ethnic, nationalistic and social tensions are at an all-time high in Turkey, exacerbated by the re‑emergence of the...

Essays

The Wrecker’s Pick. The Rationales and Hidden Agendas of Urban Renewal in the 19th and 20th Centuries

Alain Faure & translated by Christina Mitrakos - 7 June 2016

Alain Faure, a scholar of the social history of cities, puts urban renewal into perspective. He questions the...

Essays

In Havana, Tourism Development Before the US Tsunami

Lily M. Hoffman - 22 March 2016

The easing of Cuban–US relations will likely bring a new wave of tourists to Cuba. Although the Cuban government...

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