Metropolitics

Urban Renewal in the USA: A Neoliberal Policy?

Thomas Kirszbaum & translated by Oliver Waine — 2019-05-03T05:00:00Z

By allowing demolitions and evictions in well-located working-class neighborhoods, urban renewal is sometimes described as a neoliberal policy, favorable to land and property investors. But this interpretation, founded on the trauma of postwar urban policies, only tells part of the story when it comes to understanding contemporary urban renewal in the United States.
The policy of urban renewal implemented in the United States in the 1950s and 1960s came to symbolize the collusion of local

- Essays / working-class neighborhoods, working classes, urban renewal, United States, urban policy, capitalism, neoliberalism, demolition, Department of Housing and Urban Development, HOPE VI program

Beneath the Surface of Chinese Cities: Abandoned Places and Contemporary Ruins

Judith Audin & translated by Oliver Waine — 2018-09-28T05:00:00Z

Urban ruins represent a marginal subject of research within the field of Chinese studies, and yet are a precious reminder of the country's rapid urban development. By approaching these abandoned spaces through urban exploration, Judith Audin makes an original contribution to the analysis of the Chinese city.
Demolition, a violent but banal process in the Chinese urban landscape of the last 40 years, has produced the most common form of contemporary ruins in China (Meyer 2008). These

- From the Field / China, demolition, ethnography, photography, medium-sized cities, ruin porn, Shanghai, urban exploration, abandoned places, ruins, Asia, Beijing

Shrinking to Survive? Demolition and Energy Transition in Small-Town France

Yoan Miot & Max Rousseau & translated by Oliver Waine — 2017-10-18T05:00:00Z

Faced with a process of advanced decline, public and private actors in the town of Vitry-le-François, in eastern France, have developed an original strategy built around the acceptance of their town's demographic decline. This strategy, focused on energy transition, shows that contexts of urban shrinkage can foster the emergence of alternatives to conventional business-redevelopment policies.
---- Series: Shrinking Cities Although urban shrinkage is still generally tackled through

- From the Field / deindustrialization, demolition, medium-sized cities, shrinking cities, urban decline, smart decline, smart shrinkage, Champagne-Ardenne, Grand Est, Vitry-le-François, urban shrinkage, degrowth, shrinkage, energy transition, Champagne, Eastern France

The Massive Death of China's Urban Villages

Stefan Al — 2015-03-17T14:42:46Z

As expanding Chinese cities engulfed their hinterlands, chengzhoncun—villages within the city—became an affordable residential choice for migrants seeking jobs in burgeoning commercial and industrial centers, especially in the southeast of the country. Dense, chaotic and crowded, they are well-located and well-priced entry points for the workers at the heart of China's astounding growth. Now they are being torn down. Stefan Al argues that this leaves most of their former residents with a bleak

- From the Field / urban planning, urbanization, China, demolition, migrant workers, urban villages, Chinese urban planning

The reconstruction of Beirut: sowing the seeds for future conflicts?

Bruno Marot & Serge Yazigi & translated by Oliver Waine — 2012-11-14T10:59:43Z

Periods of post-war reconstruction are often the backdrop for new socio-economic and political dynamics. In Beirut, the rise of market-led urbanism, a lack of proper urban planning and the far-reaching sectarian polarisation are all factors that could raise questions about the model of urban regeneration implemented and arouse new socio-political tensions.
“Beirut in times of peace has been more disfigured and destroyed than in times of war.” While the city centre, devastated by the combats

- From the Field / gentrification, developers, governance, urban renewal, residential mobility, reconstruction, Lebanon, Beirut, conflict, urban regeneration, demolition