Metropolitics

Marielle Franco and the Fight for the City Statute in Rio de Janeiro

Ty Redden — 2025-02-14T06:00:00Z

Marielle Franco's 2018 assassination roiled social media and sent shockwaves through activist communities. The subsequent investigation revealed that her death was a part of a larger land-grabbing plot enacted by militias and enabled by local politicians. This case study explores the City Statute and its relationship to housing struggles—particularly, how the City Statute has forged a brutal partnership of oppression in Rio de Janeiro's most vulnerable neighborhoods.
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- Essays / Brazil, Rio de Janeiro, militias, favela, informal settlements, local politics, politics, race, gender, activism

Breaking Down the NYPD: How Reconsidering Political District Maps Could Open New Doors to Police Accountability

Toby Irving — 2024-02-16T04:09:00Z

Efforts to stem the power of the NYPD and the violence such power facilitates require accountability to the people of New York City. Yet such accountability is hindered by uneven distributions of power across fragmented political geographies and those closest to their communities—city council members—often have multiple police precincts with jurisdiction over their districts. In this essay, Toby Irving outlines a pathway to greater accountability through redistricting city council seats to

- Essays / New York, police violence, police accountability, police, United States, fragmentation, local governance, local government, local politics

National and Urban Politics Converge in Moscow: Will Local Activism Prevail?

Anna Zhelnina — 2019-10-01T05:00:00Z

Recent elections in Moscow and across Russia reflect the convergence of local activism and national anti-Kremlin politics.
Late on the night of September 8, 2019, when Muscovites checked the results for that day's Moscow City Council election, they realized that their vote actually meant something for the first time in many years. The candidates backed by United Russia, the ruling party, had lost in 20 districts out of 45. United Russia kept the majority, but compared to the 38 seats they

- From the Field / elections, Moscow, Russia, activism, local action, local politics

Race and Progressive Politics in Chicago

John J. Betancur & Leonor Vanik — 2019-01-09T06:00:00Z

The progressive movement in Chicago may not be as broad-minded as depicted in the academic literature. Racial polarization based on plantation politics are part of a strategy the Democratic machine used to drive a wedge in mayoral campaigns, yet additional factors are contributing toward a multifaceted fragmentation of progressives as a movement as outlined in mainstream literature.
---- Series: Progressive Mayors and Urban Social Movements This article examines progressive politics in

- From the Field / Chicago, United States, progressive urban politics, race, local politics, mayors, progressive mayors

The Making of a Progressive Mayor: James Kenney of Philadelphia

Richardson Dilworth — 2018-10-17T05:00:00Z

Philadelphia's voters elected James Kenney Mayor in 2015 after he had served more than two decades as an at‑large member of the city council. Given Kenney's roots in relatively conservative South Philadelphia, there was little to suggest that he would become a progressive mayor. Yet his personal proclivities—and need for votes as an at‑large councilmember—ultimately led him to construct an electoral coalition that combined Black, White working-class, and liberal groups.
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- Essays / United States, progressive urban politics, Philadelphia, local politics, politics, mayors, progressive mayors

Jerusalem: divisive urban planning at the heart of the Holy City

Vincent Lemire & translated by Oliver Waine — 2015-06-19T04:50:00Z

How is the Israeli–Palestinian conflict reflected in the way the city of Jerusalem has been planned and developed? In this book, based on meticulous fieldwork, Irène Salenson reveals the various actors and the manifold complex and contradictory processes involved in this particularly conflictual urban-planning context.
As a revised and abridged version of a PhD thesis defended in 2007, this work – “Jerusalem: Building Two Cities in One” – by geographer Irène Salenson is devoted to examining

- Reviews / segregation, urban planning, Palestine, local governance, Jerusalem, conflict, Israel, religion, urban geography, geopolitics, local politics