Metropolitics

Multiplied Displacement Under Racial Capitalism: The “Migrant Crisis” in Berlin and New York City

René Kreichauf — 2025-01-31T10:17:52Z

Berlin and New York City, both self-proclaimed “migrant-friendly cities,” have long been destinations for internationally displaced migrants. Yet, as René Kreichauf explains, the façade of “migrant-friendly” belies racialized policies and practices that multiply displacement and dispossession. In New York, the inauguration of Donald Trump, and the mayor's fealty to him in the hopes of a pardon, portends an intensification of the violence that multiple displacement produces.
The 21st century

- Essays / migration, criminalization of migration, migration crisis, migrant workers, migrants, Berlin, New York, United States, Germany, asylum, displacement

Resisting the Neoliberal City? The Popular Initiative in Berlin

Thomas Chevallier — 2023-02-17T06:00:00Z

Western representative democracy is in crisis. In response, direct democracy is emerging as a possible path to regeneration. The experience of “popular initiatives” in Germany illustrates the potential of the institutional innovations that support it, as well as the difficulties inherent in their implementation.
Are the instruments of direct democracy a necessary complement to representative democracy? Is it desirable to challenge the legislative monopoly of elected representatives by

- From the Field / démocratie, Allemagne, participation, libéralisme, Berlin, néolibéralisme, démocratie participative, démocratie directe, référendum, votation, initiative populaire

Underground Berlin: Where Infrastructure Meets Politics

Clarence Hatton-Proulx & translated by Oliver Waine — 2022-12-02T06:00:00Z

Water, electricity, gas: in Remaking Berlin, Timothy Moss presents a history of Berlin's infrastructure networks from 1920 to 2020, and shows how their operation has varied with successive political regimes.
For anyone interested in the history of cities, the case of Berlin is particularly rich. In less than a century, the German capital lived through a succession of different political regimes: the Weimar Republic, Nazi rule, the division of the city between two concomitant republics (one

- Reviews / Berlin, infrastructure, Germany, energy, history, networks, urban technical networks, utilities

What Has Happened in Berlin Since 1989?

Thibaut de Ruyter & Olivier Gaudin & translated by Oliver Waine — 2020-06-12T05:00:00Z

Since the fall of the Wall in November 1989, Berlin has metamorphosed into one of the world's most popular urban tourism destinations. Architect, art critic and curator Thibaut de Ruyter has witnessed these transformations firsthand and shares his impressions (originally published in French in 2019) of what has changed in the reunified German capital.
What explains Berlin's attraction as a city?
At the end of the 1980s, the city was something of an island of marginality. This is still the

- Interviews / architecture, history, urban history, memory, Germany, Berlin

Photographing the Slums of 1900s Berlin

Danièle Voldman & translated by Oliver Waine — 2018-09-14T05:00:00Z

At the turn of the 20th century, the dramatically poor conditions of urban working-class housing was a cause of major concern in many cities, and would lead to the first social-housing experiments. Photography, then a booming new technology, was one of the means used to document this problem and raise awareness of conditions, as this book on working-class housing in Berlin illustrates.
Taking as their starting point a collection of photographs taken during the first 20 years of the 20th

- Reviews / housing, urban history, social housing, slum, Berlin, Germany, history, affordable housing, photography, working classes, blue-collar workers, manual workers, workers

The Political Aesthetics of Drag

Shaka McGlotten — 2015-10-13T05:00:00Z

Drag, or the diverse art form and culture of performance that typically plays with gender and sex, is an integral part of vibrant urban life. It is also often decidedly activist and provocative. Anthropologist Shaka McGlotten uses ethnographic portraits of drag performers to explore how violent political conflict informs drag in New York City, Berlin and Tel Aviv.
Drag ecologies in New York City, Israel/Palestine, and Berlin
Drag is tied to gender impersonation and crossing, but it is also

- Essays / gender, Palestine, Berlin, New York, Israel, drag, feminism, BDSM, Featured, activism, video

Ambivalences of Gender Planning

Sandra Huning — 2013-01-23T05:55:00Z

How can a gender approach be integrated into urban planning? Sandra Huning here considers this question and presents three theoretical frameworks that, though not always easy to implement, can help formalize gender planning and create urban spaces that are more compatible with the needs of all users.
Urban planning aims to develop and design urban futures and to provide the legal and political means for the implementation of appropriate measures. It purposefully constructs spaces and

- From the Field / urban planning, gender, Berlin, Germany