Philippe Koch

The post-political trap? Reflections on politics, agency and the city:

This commentary reflects on the influence of the post-political critique on urban studies. In this literature (e.g. Swyngedouw, 2014), the default position of contemporary democracies is post-politics – the truly political is only rare, random and radical. The ‘post-political trap’ refers to the intuitively convincing, yet ultimately confining account it provides of contemporary urban governance. We identify three shortcomings. First, the binary understanding of the real political/politics as police negates the in-betweenness and contingency of actually existing urban politics. By so doing, secondly, political agency is reduced to the heroic and anti-heroic. Thus, the plurality of political agency in the urban sphere and multi-faceted forms of power lose their political quality. Third, the perceived omnipotence of the post-political order actually diminishes the possibilities of the urban as a political space of resistance and emancipation. On these grounds we argue not for a rejection of the notion of the post-political per se but for a more differentiated approach, one more alert to the contingencies of the political and of depoliticisation in the urban realm.

Bringing Power Back In: Collective and Distributive Forms of Power in Public Participation

Much public participation research is built on the assumption that participatory arrangements empower citizens and disrupt existing power structures. This article challenges that claim. Drawing on one participatory venue considered most likely to empower citizens in Basel, Switzerland, the study shows that meaningful collective power has been conferred to citizens. However, resourceful and organisationally privileged actors have influenced the impact of citizen’s demands on public decision-making in significant ways. The study concludes that the production and implementation of collective power deriving from citizens depends on distributive power sources residing in governments and bureaucracies. As a result, participatory arrangements that aim to direct state action have to conform to some extent to the rules and structures underlying ordinary policy-making. The case study highlights the intertwined relationship of the ‘power to’ and the ‘power over’ and shows how the interplay between these two forms of power places conditions on the empowering potential of participatory arrangements.

Rescaling metropolitan governance: examining discourses and conflicts in two Swiss metropolitan areas

Due to their nodal position in economic and social development, metropolitan areas give impetus to globalization. In turn, they are themselves transformed by this process. However, the question of how metropolitan areas transform by participating in the process of globalization is subject to debate. Based on case studies of two Swiss metropolitan areas (Berne and Zurich) and two policy domains (public transport and urban foreign policy), we argue that the rescaling process in metropolitan areas depends on the global competitiveness pressure the cities face and on the meaning that political actors give to these global pressures.

What is (still) political about the city

What happens to urban politics when examined through the post-political lens? In our response to Derickson, Dikec and Swyngedouw we reassert the key elements of our critique: the prescriptive understanding of politics and the inconsistent use of the urban. We close this debate with some thoughts on how we might urbanise the political.

Depoliticization and urban politics : moving beyond the “post-political” city

Privatization of urban space is increasing, the needs of the global economy push out those of ordinary citizens and austerity increasingly provides the horizons of urban politics. On these grounds, one can quite easily understand the appeal of the post-political city thesis as articulated by urbanist Erik Swyngedouw. His post-political city is largely devoid of proper politics, governed instead through managerial consensus-driven political systems. In this chapter, we consider the implications of this approach for the field of urban studies. We assert that closer inspection of the post-political city thesis shows a restricting account of contemporary urban politics, unhelpful for thinking about the dynamics of (de)politicization in urban contexts. Our main argument is that work within the frame of the post-political city avoids or is inconsistent about the “urban”, while being very prescriptive about politics. This is problematic because the “post-political city” has become something of a label for the lack of politics in and about the city. We conclude the piece by proposing ways of realigning the field of enquiry. Our fundamental concern throughout is epistemological: when we look at the city through the post-political lens, what happens to politics?

Urban everyday politics: politicising practices and the transformation of the here and now

This article responds to both ongoing urban practices and strands of urban theory by arguing for a (re-)turn to the everyday as a means of thinking about antagonism and political possibility. We examine how the everyday might be conceived politically and wonder what it is about the current conjuncture that is fuelling the reimagining of the political possibility of the urban. We develop the category of urban everyday politics to capture the politicised everyday practices observable in our towns and cities: collective, organised and strategic practices that articulate a political antagonism embedded in, but breaking with, urban everyday life through altering socio-spatial relations. While we make no empirical claims about the current impact of this form of politics, we assert the political potential of viewing the everyday as a source, stake and site of dissensus in current urban conditions. Politicising the urban everyday offers, we conclude, a strategy for transformative politics, one in which the state recedes from view, micropolitical action is transcended and democratic possibilities lie in the transformation of the urban here and now.

Die Rolle von Gemeinden bei bürgerinitiierten Alterswohnprojekten

Die vorliegende Studie untersucht die Rolle von Gemeinden bei burgerinitiierten Alterswohnprojekten einerseits und die Instrumente und das Verhalten von Gemeinden bei der Bereitstellung von Wohninfrastruktur fur betagte Menschen in der deutschsprachigen Schweiz andererseits. Die Untersuchung wurde im Auftrag der Age Stiftung, die burgerinitiierte Alterswohnprojekte unterstutzt, vom Institut fur Politikwissenschaft der Universitat Zurich im Zeitraum von April 2011 bis Januar 2012 durchgefuhrt. Die empirischen Grundlagen basieren auf einer Onlinebefragung aller Deutschschweizer Gemeinden zu den kommunalen Instrumente und Handlungsformen in der Alterswohnpolitik. Zudem wurde Fallstudien zu sechs burgerinitiierten Alterswohnprojekten durchgefuhrt. Die Analyse zeigt auf, dass sich die kommunalen Rollen und Instrumente in der Alterswohnpolitik zwischen den Gemeinden erheblich unterscheiden. Grundsatzlich sind bevolkerungsmassig grosse Gemeinden und Stadte (mehr als 5 000 Einwohner) aktiver und verfugen uber zahlreichere Instrumente. In kleinen Gemeinden (weniger als 1 000) besteht aufgrund der Sozialstruktur eine geringere Nachfrage nach Alterswohnangeboten. Ein zusatzlicher Bedarf an burgerinitiierten Alterswohnprojekten lasst sich besonders in mittelgrossen Gemeinden (zwischen 1 000 und 5 000 Einwohner) feststellen. Die am haufigsten gewahlten Instrumente der Gemeinden sind die finanzielle Unterstutzung von Projekten, die Abgabe von Bauland im Baurecht sowie die Mitwirkung in Projektorganisationen. Die kommunale Alterswohnpolitik ist besonders in kleinen und mittelgrossen Gemeinden wenig institutionalisiert und stark an einzelne Personen gebunden. Wenig uberraschend zeigt die Studie, dass die fruhzeitige Klarung und Sicherstellung der Finanzierung entscheidend fur den Verlauf und den Erfolg von burgerinitiierten Alterswohnprojekten ist. Schliesslich verdeutlichen die Fallstudien, dass die Beziehung zwischen der Gemeinde und der Projekttragerschaft von der Projektgestaltung und -phase abhangig ist. Je nachdem wie stark sich ein Projekt an der Unterstutzung seitens der Gemeinde ausrichtet, ist das Projekt von Entscheidungen und Handlungen der Gemeinde abhangig und damit potentiell starker kommunalpolitischen Konflikten ausgesetzt. Die Empfehlungen, die auf der Basis der Untersuchungsergebnisse formuliert werden, richten sich erstens an Trager burgerinitiierter Alterswohnprojekte, zweitens an politische Gemeinden und drittens an Forderstiftungen und andere Forderstellen, welche Projekte im Bereich Wohnen im Alter unterstutzen. Den Projekttragern empfehlen wir, Finanzierungsmoglichkeiten fruhzeitig zu klaren, die Professionalitat und lokale Einbindung zu optimieren, die Nahe zur politischen Gemeinde entsprechend den Projektzielen abzuwagen und positive Aussenwirkungen zu schaffen. Politischen Gemeinden empfehlen wir, Instrumente zur Forderung von burgerinitiierten Alterswohnprojekte fruhzeitig zu entwickeln, diese besser in die kommunale Alterspolitik einzubinden, die Risiken einer eigenen finanziellen Beteiligung langfristig und differenziert abzuklaren und burgerinitiierte Alterswohnprojekte auch als Chance zur Forderung zivilgesellschaftlichen Engagements wahrzunehmen. Den Forderstiftungen und anderen Forderstellen empfehlen wir schliesslich, einen Leitfaden zur Prozessgestaltung als Hilfeleistung fur die Projekttrager zu entwickeln, politische Gemeinden starker in den Fokus der Forderpraxis zu nehmen und den Zeitpunkt der Forderung auf den Projektablauf abzustimmen.

PROGRESSIVE AND SUSTAINED SCHOOL REFORMS: FRAMING AND COALITION BUILDING IN SWISS CITIES

ABSTRACT: Urban politics in the early 21st century is structured by conflicts over social cohesion and economic competitiveness. Education policy takes center stage in this struggle as schools are institutions of both social and economic reproduction. I draw on arguments of urban regime and policy frame analysis to examine the politics of urban school reform in two Swiss cities. Empirically, I analyze neighborhood-embedded bottom-up school reforms committed to social cohesion. The paths these reforms eventually take were shaped by different coalitions geared around specific school policy frames. Frames indeed play a crucial role in building a coalition toward progressive school reforms. In addition, their sustainability in a political environment, increasingly shifting toward development policies, hinges on the dominant frame underlying the reforms as well as the properties of the network advancing them.