240028 VS Neoliberal Urbanism: Urban Development Under Processes of Political-Economic Restructuring (3.3.3) (2017W)

This seminar offers a broad overview of major themes and discussions around the political economy of urbanization in the last decade. Urban development is profoundly shaped through broader processes of political-economic restructuring that are interrelated with transformation of modern states, statehood and local governance structures. After covering a variety of foundational readings on urban development and its relation to logics of market-oriented practices, and surveying some of the key themes in recent debates on neoliberal urbanism, we explore some case studies based on ethnographic fieldwork from different parts of the world. One of the purposes of this course is to encourage students to reflect on newly emerging meanings attached to culture, belonging and identity within the frame of global and neoliberal economy.