Metropolitics

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

(Re)Constructing Inequality: Community Development in Public and Private

Claire Dunning — 2021-12-14T06:00:00Z

Claire Dunning reviews Jeremy R. Levine's new book, Constructing Community, an ethnographic study of community development projects in Boston.
For a book about urban poverty and redevelopment, Constructing Community recounts few protests or headline-grabbing incidents. Instead, the drama unfolds slowly over the course of a decade in poorly lit community rooms, downtown board rooms, and the backseats of cars. This is a book about the banalities of bureaucracy and governance—a fact that author

- Reviews / Boston, Massachusetts, United States, mass transit, rapid transit, transport, public transportation, community-based organizations, urban poverty, redevelopment, poverty, governance, local governance, urban governance, ethnography

In Search of Grand Paris: Pierre Mansat on the Eve of the June 2020 Municipal Elections

Magda Maaoui & Pierre Mansat — 2020-06-26T05:00:00Z

Magda Maaoui interviews Pierre Mansat, former deputy mayor of Paris and a founding father of “le Grand Paris” (the metropolitan authority for Greater Paris), about Grand Paris and the limits of political action at the municipal level in light of the upcoming municipal elections.
Less than a week before 12 million Parisians vote in the second round of elections for their mayors and their municipal councils, which has now been delayed from March 22 to June 28 owing to the coronavirus lockdown,

- Interviews / Grand Paris, Grand Paris Express, Greater Paris, Paris region, Paris, Île-de-France, France, banlieue, suburbs, metropolitan areas, metropolitan restructuring, metropolis, territorial equality, territorial reform, governance, local governance, metropolization, coronavirus, Covid-19, public transportation, transport, mass transit, intercommunality

Inclusive Place-Based Leadership: Lesson-Drawing from Urban Governance Innovations in Bristol, UK

Robin Hambleton — 2018-10-09T05:00:00Z

Across the world, progressive city leaders are working to limit the damaging impact of decisions made by “placeless” leaders, meaning powerful interests that are unconcerned about the consequences of their decisions for particular places and communities. Robin Hambleton outlines a new way of thinking about place-based leadership and reports on the steps being taken by Mayor Marvin Rees and other civic leaders in Bristol, UK, to test this model in practice.
---- Series: Progressive Mayors and

- From the Field / local government, governance, local governance, United Kingdom, progressive urban politics, civic innovation, progressive mayors, city leadership, power of place, collaborative governance, inclusion, Bristol, England

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

Northern Mafias: the territorial spread of organised crime in Italy

Fabrizio Maccaglia & translated by Oliver Waine — 2015-02-26T05:50:00Z

The presence of Mafia organisations outside the Mezzogiorno, long downplayed by the Italian public authorities, has become more visible in recent years. A collective work sheds light on the spread of Mafia activity in Italy, and in particular the mechanisms used to infiltrate local economic and political fabrics.
The presence of Mafia-type organisations in regions other than those where they have been historically rooted since the second half of the 19th century (western Sicily for Cosa

- Reviews / local governance, Italy, territorial development, corruption, Mafia

Is rurality a thing of the past?

Philippe Dubourg & translated by Oliver Waine — 2015-01-08T05:50:00Z

In the era of globalisation and metropolisation, is rurality an old-fashioned concept, a thing of the past? The arsenal of reforms and laws that have been passed – indeed, often forced through – in recent years in France seems to give weight to this idea, while the economic crisis has proved to be the perfect opportunity to (dis)unite small local authorities under the steamroller of global finance.
Metropolisation means concentrating not only economic life but also collective human existence

- Debates / France, rural, governance, local governance, intercommunality, village, metropolization, territorial equality

The mixed success of Toronto's metropolitan merger

Guillaume Poiret & translated by Oliver Waine — 2013-11-20T05:50:00Z

While the debate on local-government reform rages on in France, Guillaume Poiret looks back at the municipal mergers that took place in Toronto in 1997. Although amalgamation has not resulted in the kind of demergers seen in Montreal, it has not had the anticipated economic benefits either, and leaves the metropolitan question – and the attendant democratic challenges – unanswered.
Since the City of Toronto Act, or Bill 103, of 17 December 1997, the City of Toronto has comprised the former

- From the Field / governance, local governance, intercommunality, metropolis, territorial reform, Canada, Toronto

The role of proximities in improving territorial governance

Lise Bourdeau-Lepage & translated by Oliver Waine — 2013-07-10T04:55:00Z

What can be done to improve territorial governance? André Torre and Jean-Eudes Beuret emphasise the role of proximity in this process, where conflict and negotiation are two sides of the same coin.
This work, through its 105 pages, proposes the broad lines of a method for managing and coordinating territories using a proximity-based approach (Gilly and Torre 2000; Pecqueur and Zimmermann 2004). The key idea is relatively simple and can be stated as follows: territories are subject to major

- Reviews / local governance, proximity, conflict, negotiation

The Negotiated Urbanism of Grand Paris Express

Lara Belkind — 2013-06-12T04:55:00Z

In the fragmented context of Paris's metropolitan and regional politics, the Grand Pari(s) design consultation and subsequent public process demonstrate that the Grand Paris Express project, a major new orbital metro line, can become a form of emergent governance and negotiated planning.
Although the Grand Pari(s) design consultation can be interpreted as a strategy through which the state regained control of the metropolitan narrative, this does not signal a return to the centralized

- Debates / banlieue, Île-de-France, Grand Paris, participation, public transportation, Paris region, urban planning, governance, Paris, local governance, transport, metropolis, Greater Paris, consultation, negotiation, mass transit