new urban challenges in times of financial capitalism
Post on 15-Apr-2017
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Land Governance for Equitable and Sustainable Development Conference
New Urban Challengesin times of financial
capitalism
Cities are cultural artefacts and they embody livelihoods and economies
The way we produce space is intimately related to our economies, understood broadly.
In fact, some say the main fuel of capitalist accumulation is urbanisation. This has implications
for the sustainability of cities in neoliberalism.
The association of the production of urban space and capitalism is very old. Henri Pirenne identifies the rise of
Italian and Flemish cities with the appearance of mercantile capitalism at the end of the Middle Ages. This ‘extraordinary exchange’ unleashed the creative forces that characterised the Renaissance and provided the
capital for the great banking families who lent money to newly formed national states for the first colonial
exploitations.
Colonisation on the other hand produced the incredible
accumulation of capitals that would later finance industrialisation and
would expand this new mode of production around the globe.
Industrialisation and mechanisation (and especially the invention of the railway) altered the urban landscape forever
But the logic of industrial mass production was also used for te production of space and unequal accumulation often meant very low salaries were paid. Workers often lived in appalling
conditions.
The urban slum was born
But Fordism would change all that with the idea that a consumers’ class needed to be created so
that goods could be sold.
That was the beginning of the American dream with its ever larger cars, transporting people to ever farther
suburbs where there were ever larger houses
Lefebvre and then Harvey: The Urbanisation of Capital
The Dutch version of suburbanisation: home ownership as a mechanism to promote growth and prosperity (don’t forget the Netherlands is a very particular type of entrepreneurial welfare state!)
Houses and offices need to be furnished
Infrastructure needs to be built to connect suburbs and new corporate centralities
and cars need to be bought
but there are limits to this process
Until the city becomes the fuel of capital accumulation
in times of financial capitalism, real estate
speculation has become one of the main motors for
urbanisation
There are more spectacular embodiments of the financialisation of urban space
Dubai
Hong Kong
Pudong
Sao Paulo: global city in the semi-periphery of capitalism
but this model is becoming exhausted (and part of the problem is neoliberalism itself)
Thai 1997 Crisis: ‘Monuments to Speculators’
Spanish 2008 Real Estate Bubble: ‘The Cities That Never Were’
United States Subprime Mortgage Crisis ‘House of Cards’
The Big Short
Chinese Ghost Cities
the next chapterthe next chapterthe next chapterthe next chapter
Chinese Ghost CitiesChinese Ghost Cities
Meanwhile
Favela Paraisopolis, Sao Paulo, Brazil
Brazil: 100 million new urban dwellers in the
post-war alone
Favela da Rocinha, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Complementarity of formal and informal INSIDE THE SAME LOGIC OF PRODUCTION OF
URBAN SPACE: RIGHTS DEFICIT + EXCLUSION
(or another kind of inclusion?)
Favela da Rocinha, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
While part of cities is produced within the logic I described above, a big part of it is produced apparently ‘outside’ that logic, but informal urbanisation has in reality a
symbiotic relationship with formal urbanisation.
Slum in Haiti after 2010 earthquake
The Latin American slum is slowly becoming more urbanised, but new slums
are appearing all the time, as a substantial part of Latin Americans do not have access to formal means of financing and can not
access the formal housing market.
but why….? globalisation
(again)
globalisation of production means that countries all over the word are
inserted in production chains that promote some sort of ‘subordinate’,
incomplete or defective modernisation in the periphery of capitalism
(Subordinate) modernisation has
triggered unchecked rural to urban migration
(Subordinate) modernisation means that
modernisation happens without inclusion and without
substantive citizenship
An example of subordinate modernisation is the garment industry in Bangladesh: formal
employment without guarantees, extremely low wages and appalling working conditions: rights deficit.
Subordinate modernisation happens (mostly) in weak
institutional contexts , where the rule of law is defective
and there is a deficit in civil rights
Exclusive urbanisation
it produces
Urban exclusion is not the result of poverty (only).
It is the result of complex ecosystems of world production in which some countries or regions have a subordinate role, with some groups of
people taking the blunt of the prevailing unequal distribution of gains over production.
• deregulation of labour relations • transfer of industrial jobs overseas • shrinkage of the State • privatisation of public services • the reduction of social services • erosion of the concept of public good • the debacle of spatial planning
neoliberalism is an economic doctrine that propagates:
informal settlements are improving and a market exists in slums:
inclusion in the capitalist logic of city production is happening, but at
extremely high human, political and environmental costs
is this sustainable?
is this fair?
powerful indictment of neoliberalism as unable to
provide sustainable urbanisation
‘Minha casa minha vida’ Brazilian federal programme
Poor official responses
Mexic
oPoor official responses
Sao P
aulo
Poor official responses
socially
environmentally
economically
unsustainable
Sustainable urbanisation is key to successful development(…) “ If well managed, cities offer important opportunities for economic development and for expanding access to basic services, including health care and education, for large numbers of people. Providing public transportation, as well as housing, electricity, water and sanitation for a densely settled urban population is typically cheaper and less environmentally damaging than providing a similar level of services to a dispersed rural population”.
Source: http://www.un.org/en/development/desa/news/population/world-urbanization-prospects-2014.html
Planning Urgencies in Latin American
Cities
1. How to bridge the social & spatial divide that How to bridge the social & spatial divide that How to bridge the social & spatial divide that
characterises the LATAM capitalist citycharacterises the LATAM capitalist citycharacterises the LATAM capitalist city?
Source: Instituto Pereira Passos, http://portalgeo.rio.rj.gov.brSource: Instituto Pereira Passos, http://portalgeo.rio.rj.gov.br
2.How to integrate millions of city dwellers while upholding
2.How to integrate millions of city dwellers while upholding
citizens’ ‘right to the city’?
3.How to harmonise urgent environmental issues (climate change) with social needs?
4.How to preserve the social function of property
4.How to preserve the social function of property
4.How to preserve the social function of property in face of
4.How to preserve the social function of property
savage unregulated real estate market?
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5. How to harmonise housing, liveability and sustainabilit
5. How to harmonise housing, liveability and sustainability in explosively
5. How to harmonise housing, liveability and sustainabilit
5. How to harmonise housing, liveability and sustainabilit
5. How to harmonise housing, liveability and sustainability in explosively y in explosively
growing cities in weak governance environments with a deficit of citizens rights
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6. How to improve the quality of city management and
6. How to improve the quality of city management and
promote good and fair governance
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7. How to promote fair access, use, regulation, and taxation of urban land
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Spatial Justice?
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How to promote urban reform without fundamentally changing the way we deal with urban land and urban property in the city
produced by financial capitalism ?
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