The Disappearance of the State from “Livable” Urban Spaces

By Katherine B. Hankins and Emily M. Powers

“With 5,000 homes and any number of options
to choose from in Atlantic Station there is something
for every style, taste and pricerange for people
who want to be a part of the exciting residential life
in this incredible new community.”
http://www.atlanticstation.com/live.php

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“(…) In this paper, we argue two interrelated points. First, urban livability as a discourse that shapes [...]

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The Work of Neoliberal Governmentality: Temporality and Ethical Substance in the Tale of Two Dads

By Sam Binkley, Emerson College
Rich Dad Poor Dad is a best selling book on financial advice written by Robert T. Kiyosaki. Originally self-published in 1997 as supporting material for Kiyosaki’s financial advice lectures, and later picked up by Warner Business Books in 2000, the text relates a rich allegorical narrative about the mental hard wiring [...]

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What is an American City?

By Michael Katz
“The April 25, 2006, death of Jane Jacobs was one of the events that prompted me to rethink my narrative of recent urban history. If any one person can be anointed patron saint of urban studies, Jacobs deserves the crown. Her 1961 Death and Life of Great American Cities must be the most [...]

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Le Brésil, ce géant entravé

Un modèle menacé para la dépendance finacière
English version here
Par Renaud Lambert
En Equateur, grâce à une politique qu’il qualifie de « sociale et solidaire », et qui renforce le rôle de l’Etat, M. Rafael Correa a été réélu dès le premier tour de l’élection présidentielle du 26 avril. Au Panamá, le 3 mai, après le mandat décevant en matière de réduction [...]

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Let them Eat Social Capital: Socializing the Market versus Marketizing the Social

By Margaret Somers
“We have seen the enemy and it is us. No longer should we blame neoliberalism’s starvation of the public sector and its privatizing restructuring of the economy for escalating rates of poverty, skyrocketing inequality, or the constriction of democracy. No, it is the fault of your and my delinquency in our bowling league [...]

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Governing Global Slums: The Biopolitics of Target 11

By Tim Di Muzio
“The technologies of the self found in global slums aim to cultivate the capacities of the poor and range from educating the self about sanitation and hygiene to undertaking skills training and learning to be responsible debtors, savers, and entrepreneurs. For instance, one of the most widespread modes of subjectification in informal [...]

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Negotiating identity – An excursion into the world of a business city

By Anna-Maria Murtola
Read if full here
“What Newtown actually is, is an interesting issue to consider. It is a new kind of retail-concept – a crossbreed between a shopping centre, an exhibition centre, and a travelling destination providing the visitor with an experience. It has also been presented as a green business city, the idea of [...]

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Contours of the Neoliberal City: fragmentation, frontier geographies, and the new circularity

By Nasser Abourahme
“The slum in and of itself creates a different kind of governmentality;
AlSayyad and Roy point out that the apparently unregulated practices of
squatting are in fact a distinct form of regulation, “a set of tactics
that recreate informality as governmentality” [2006: 8]. This
informality operates through the constant negotiability of value (as
opposed to the fixing of [...]

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Legal Luck

By Slajov Zizek
“A “postmodern” boss insists that he is not a master but just a coordinator of our joint creative efforts, the first among equals; there should be no formalities among us, we should address him by his nickname, he shares a dirty joke with us… but in all this, he remains our master. In [...]

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La macchina dell’auto–responsabilità: una storia dell’ideologia liberale

By Robert Kurz
“Oggi tutti noi ci comportiamo “autoregolativamente” come robot della responsabilità personale dell’economia di mercato.Quell’antico concetto di “libertà” cui mirava l’autonomia sociale appare oggi primitivo e preindustriale. Naturalmente noi non possiamo e non vogliamo ritornare ad un angustomodo di vivere agrario, da contadini ed artigiani. Ma il prezzo del progresso deve consistere nella degradazione [...]

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