Mobile Urbanism

Cities and Policymaking in the Global Age

Edited by Eugene McCann and Kevin Ward

Foreword by Allan Cochrane

Contributions by Doreen Massey

How knowledge and power flow between places and impact cities worldwide

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256 Pages, 6 x 9 in

Paperback
9780816656295
Published: April 6, 2011
Series: Globalization and Community

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Mobile Urbanism

Cities and Policymaking in the Global Age

Series: Globalization and Community

Edited by Eugene McCann and Kevin Ward

Foreword by Allan Cochrane

Contributions by Doreen Massey

ISBN: 9780816656295

Publication date: April 6th, 2011

256 Pages

8 x 5

"At the core of this book is the recognition that far and near no longer be taken for granted. This makes it possible to explore geographies of responsibility as they stretch across space, highlighting linkages that are otherwise rather too easy to avoid. It also makes it possible to explore the ways in which apparently distant phenomena can be drawn in by political actors to reinforce their position, to develop political initiatives, resolve or generate political controversy, and build political power and authority." —Allan Cochrane, from the Foreword

Mobile Urbanism provides a unique set of perspectives on the current global-urban condition. Drawing on cutting-edge theoretical work, leading geographers reveal that cities are not isolated objects of study; rather, they are dynamic, global–local assemblages of policies, practices, and ideas.

The essays in this volume argue for a theorizing of both urban policymaking and place-making that understands them as groups of territorial and relational geographies. It broadens our comprehension of agents of transference, reconceiving how policies are made mobile, and acknowledging the importance of interlocal policy mobility. Through the richness of its empirical examples from Europe, North America, South America, Africa, Asia, and Australia, contributors bring to light the significant methodological challenges that researchers face in the study of an urban–global, territorial–relational conceptualization of cities and suggest productive new approaches to understanding urbanism in a networked world.

Contributors: S. Harris Ali, York U, Toronto; Allan Cochrane, Open U; Roger Keil , York U, Toronto; Doreen Massey, Open U; Donald McNeill, U of Western Sydney; Jamie Peck, U of British Columbia; Jennifer Robinson, University College London.

Eugene McCann is associate professor of geography at Simon Fraser University. Kevin Ward is professor of human geography at the University of Manchester.

Foreword, Allan Cochrane
Introduction. Urban Assemblages: Territories, Relations, Practices, and Power, Eugene McCann and Kevin Ward
1. A Counterhegemonic Relationality of Place, Doreen Massey
2. The Spaces of Circulating Knowledge: City Strategies and Global Urban Governmentality, Jennifer Robinson
3. Creative Moments: Working Culture, Through Municipal Socialism and Neoliberal Urbanism, Jamie Peck
4. Policies in Motion and in Place: The Case of Business Improvement Districts, Kevin Ward
5. Points of Reference: Knowledge of Elsewhere in the Politics of Urban Drug Policy, Eugene McCann
6. The Urban Political Pathology of Emerging Infectious Disease in the Age of the Global City, Roger Keil and S. Harris Ali
7. Airports, Territoriality, and Urban Governance, Donald McNeill
Conclusion. Cities Assembled: Space, Neoliberalization, (re)Territorialization, and Comparison, Kevin Ward and Eugene McCann
Acknowledgments
Contributors
Index