Peter Marcuse

From critical urban theory to the right to the city

The right to the city is becoming, in theory and in practice, a widespread, effective formulation of a set of demands to be actively thought through and pursued. But whose right, what right and to what city? Each question is examined in turn, first in the historical context of 1968 in which Henri Lefebvre first popularized the phrase, then in its meaning for the guidance of action. The conclusion suggests that exposing, proposing and politicizing the key issues can move us closer to implementing this right.

The Enclave, the Citadel, and the Ghetto What has Changed in the Post-Fordist U.S. City

The author defines classic ghetto as the result of the involuntary spatial segregation of a group that stands in a subordinate political and social relationship to its surrounding society, the enclave as a voluntarily developed spatial concentration of a group for purposes of promoting the welfare of its members, and the citadel as created by a dominant group to protect or enhance its superior position. The author describes a new phenomenon, connected to global economic changes: the outcast ghetto, inhabited by those excluded from the mainstream economy by the forces of macroeconomic developments. The distinction among these differing forms of spatial separation is crucial for a number of public policies.

Sustainability is not enough

This paper critically reviews the concept of sustainability, especially as it has come to be applied outside of environmental goals. It suggests “sustainability” should not be considered as a goal for a housing or urban programme – many bad programmes are sustainable – but as a constraint whose absence may limit the usefulness of a good programme. It also discusses how the promotion of “sustainability” may simply encourage the sustaining of the unjust status quo and how the attempt to suggest that everyone has common interests in “sustainable urban development” masks very real conflicts of interest.

Cities for people, not for profit

Taylor and Francis CCIT_A_402227. gm 10.1080/13604810903020548 ity: Analysis of Urban Trends 360-4813 (pri t)/147 -3629 (online) Original Article 2 09 & Francis -3 0 00 June-September 2 09 NeilB nne neil.b @nyu.edu he rapidly unfolding global economic recession is dramatically intensifying the contradictions around which urban social movements have been rallying, suddenly validating their claims regarding the unsustainability and destructiveness of neoliberal forms of urbanization. Cities across Europe, from London, Copenhagen, Paris and Rome to Athens, Reykjavik, Riga and Kiev, have erupted in demonstrations, strikes and protests, often accompanied by violence. Youthful activists are not alone in their outrage that public money is being doled out to the banks even as the destabilization of economic life and the intensification of generalized social insecurity continues. The Economist Intelligence Unit (2009) recently offered the following observation:

The Ghetto of Exclusion and the Fortified Enclave New Patterns in the United States

Three key developments are described: (a) the transformation of the earlier racial ghettos into excluded ghettos, class/racial ghettos of the excluded and abandoned, resulting from a combination of hyperpauperization and racism; (b) a qualitatively new phase of the totalizing suburb, in which “edge cities” are created combining residential, business, social, and cultural areas that are removed from older central cities and overlaid on earlier patterns of suburbanization, representing a dramatic and expanded form of the exclusionary enclave; and (c) the parallel transformation of luxury and upper-class residences (and, increasingly, businesses and social and cultural facilities—thus similarly totalizing) into separate areas, appropriately called fortified citadels, each again separated from the other parts of the city by social, economic, and often physical barriers. The three developments are intimately connected with each other and mutually reinforcing.

Professional Ethics and Beyond: Values in Planning

Abstract Professionalization of planning and the credentialing processes that will accompany it add importance to a review of the role of professional ethics in planning. Existing ethical standards are often inherently contradictory, guild oriented, and inconsistent with the public image the profession attempts to maintain. The more publicly oriented prescriptions are not designed to be enforced. Generally they are a weak guide to ethical conduct for practicing planners. Planning theories suggest ethical standards going beyond professional prescriptions. A historical or structural approach would further suggest that professionally derived standards will be inherently system maintaining and that efforts to inject more progressive and enforceable guidelines into professional codes are likely to meet major resistance within the profession.

Reflections on Berlin: The Meaning of Construction and the Construction of Meaning

• A whole new set of state buildings, in a prominently located government center (the German word is more expressive — ‘ Regierungsviertel ’, a ‘quarter for ruling’) at a cost of billions, for a Germany that sees itself as the dominant country in a united Europe; • At Potsdamer Platz, the European headquarters of Sony, a major structure for ABB technologies and the central building for Daimler-Benz-Messerschmidt’s information products and services, oriented to take advantage of the newly opened eastern market, the whole making virtually a second or third city center; • Friedrichstraße, before the war a main commercial axis for Berlin, after the war just another street within the anti-market German Democratic Republic, now striving for a role as the luxury shopping street of Germany, the Fifth Avenue of Berlin; • Huge infrastructure works, a new central railroad station connecting the government center with all Europe, a new auto tunnel under that center, cultural facilities galore, including a new Jewish Museum, and a host of private speculative office buildings; • A proposed ‘Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe’, often referred to as a Holocaust memorial (the German word is ‘Mahnmal’, a ‘warning monument’, rather than simply ‘memorial’, which is‘Denkmal’).

The urban mosaic of post-socialist Europe

The book explores urban dynamics in post-socialist Europe 15 years after the fall of communism. The ‘urban mosaic’ metaphor expresses the complexity, diversity and uniqueness of the processes and spatial outcomes in post-socialist cities. The book examines the urban development and the policy and planning processes that have resulted from the socio-economic, political, and institutional transformations characterizing the move to markets and democracy. The emerging urban phenomena are illustrated with indepth case studies, sensitive to historical themes, cultural issues and the socialist legacy. Cities featured in the book include: Kazan, St. Petersburg, Moscow, Warsaw, Prague, Komarno, Budapest, Belgrade, Bucharest, Sofia and Tirana. The edited volume is organized around the following four themes: the driving forces of post-socialist change; urban processes and spatial change; housing and retail sector transformation; and urban planning and policy responses.

Urban form and globalization after September 11th: the view from New York

The attack on the World Trade Center will have a significant effect on urban development in New York City, not so much because it will change existing patterns, but because it will intensify them. The effect will come from the way leaders in the political and business community act after September 11th, more than from what the attack itself accomplished. Among the key effects will be a further barricading of spaces within the city, a concentrated deconcentration of business activities away from the center and their citadelization. The process of public planning is increasingly irrelevant; deplanning might be a better word for it. Decision-making is concentrated in quasi-governmental bodies, freed from the obligation to follow democratic procedures. Business groups, particularly those involved in global processes, are well organized and are pressing for planning and for subsidies serving their interests. There is publicly-oriented activity also, but less focused and not (yet?) raising distributional and social justice issues as central concerns. The net result is a further skewing of the benefits and costs of globalization. Copyright Joint Editors and Blackwell Publishers Ltd 2002.

The New Urbanism: The Dangers so Far

The “New Urbanism” is probably the most widely-discussed innovation in planning in the United States today, and its influence is spreading in many parts of the world, from Brazil to Turkey, with impacts from Beijing to South Africa. A Congress for a New Urbanism has been founded to promulgate its precepts, and its advocates often seem like missionaries for a new gospel. Over 200 projects linked to its approach have been completed or are under way in the United States, and many more are on the drawing boards. [1] Seaside, Florida, is probably its best-known example. National home builders associations, mayors, and most recently the Department of Housing and Urban Development itself, have bought into or at least are formally espousing the ideas of the New Urbanism. But it raises a number of serious questions that call out for exploration and evaluation. Rather than trying to present a balanced account and evaluation here, let me rather simply list the problems that I see involved with the approach, leaving it to advocates and further experience to round out the picture and help arrive at a conclusion.