The politics of landscape as ways of life in the ‘divided’ city: reflections from Mostar,Bosnia–Herzegovina

ABSTRACT

‘Divided’ cities – places of extreme exclusion and polarization – are sites where the paradox of both fragmentary and cosmopolitan capacity of the city comes to the fore. This article asks: What practices-in-landscape consolidate, construct and deconstruct the impression of a divided city? Drawing insights from the post-conflict Mostar, Bosnia and Herzegovina, the main argument I put forward is that urban infrastructures are a crucial medium through which social divisions and cohesions are performed and rearticulated on the ground. The article attends to the everyday of youth in Mostar turning to the politics of landscape as ways of life in the city.     

Local housing plans: Learning from Great Britain

Abstract

As the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development refines the new Consolidated Plans, which replace the Comprehensive Housing Affordability Strategies, it should examine Britain's experience with local housing plans. Case studies of four best‐practice cities—Glasgow, Dundee, Birmingham, and York—highlight the value of these plans in assessing the success of cities in their new “enabler” role.

Five key lessons for American cities emerge from this article. First, these plans can serve multiple roles beyond bids to central government. Second, local housing plans should address market‐rate as well as below‐market‐rate housing issues. Third, American housing plans should use a wider range of data sources than census information alone and should incorporate housing market analyses dealing with specific areas and population groups. Fourth, the stress on implementation and strategy in British plans should be emulated. Finally, aspects of Britain's competitive bidding system should be considered for implementation.     

Ethnic Decentralization and the Challenges of Inclusive Governance in Multiethnic Cities: The Case of Dire Dawa,Ethiopia

Abstract

Ethnic decentralization which could emerge in the form of autonomy and/or federalism has become an important way of responding to the challenges of ethno-nationalist conflicts. Since 1991, Ethiopia has adopted an ethnic federal structure which provides territorial autonomy to its various ethnic groups. This approach to autonomy, however, has brought challenges to multiethnic cities and ethnic borderlands where different ethnic groups coexist. By examining the experience of Dire Dawa, the second largest city in Ethiopia, this article shows how federalism and territorial autonomy by themselves are not enough to address problems of participatory governance in multiethnic cities. The article finally underscores the need for policy innovations that would ensure power-sharing in multiethnic cities.     

Gated communities: The new ideal way of life in natal,Brazil

Abstract

Gated communities have been growing quickly in Brazil's urban and suburban areas since the 1980s, bringing challenges to society through their privatization of public space, conflict with planning norms, and interference with the integrated planning of the cities in which they are built. My article analyzes this phenomenon to establish a clear basis for purposeful public policies in Brazil. The analysis is based on a case study of the first three closed condominiums in Natal. It involves 31 semistructured interviews focusing on legal, urban/architectural, and segregational factors and their implications.

Federal and local governments have contributed, deliberately or unwittingly, to the development of such enclosed complexes, which have social and spatial impacts and guarantee that the upper class will remain wealthy. There also seems to be a close relationship between the spread of fortified residences and the promotion of a “culture of fear.”     

The Fundamentalist City,Medieval Modernity,and the Arab Spring

Abstract

The Arab World has witnessed massive popular uprisings that seek to overturn years of authoritarianism and supposedly bring about democratic change and social justice. These uprisings evoke both optimism and pessimism about religion, violence, and their connection to cities. As people in various parts of the Arab world embark on their quest for self-government, there is no telling where this great experiment will lead. Based on current indications, religion will play a decisive role in shaping the futures of these nations, and particularly their cities. These directions seem to be charted by the religious parties that have come to power, and through a series of subtle and gradual policies that are setting the foundations for future theocratic states. The aim of this article is to explore the urban processes by which religious ideologies transform into fundamentalist urban movements, and how their actions are starting to reshape the cities of the Arab World.     

Love,activism, and the possibility of radical social change in Mostar

ABSTRACT

This article reflects on the meanings and possibilities of social change in Mostar, a city more often associated with the seeming impossibility of eradicating ethno-national divisions and corruption that paralyses it. It focuses on the under-researched politics of grassroots activism by drawing on Hardt’s and Negri’s work on the political potential of ‘love’ to shape and propel radical politics. Overall, the article reveals the lack of a cohesive agenda of grassroots politics in Mostar, and asks whether love (that creates and sustains political movement) can educate, patiently, to the revolution.     

Comparing Urban Citizenship,Sanctuary Cities,Local Bureaucratic Membership,and Regularizations

Irregular migrants tend to live in dense urban settings. Cities respond to this phenomenon with a variety of urban immigration and citizenship policies in support of irregular migrants. These urban policies produce a disparity between local inclusion and national exclusion. This article describes and compares such urban policies, namely, urban citizenship, sanctuary cities, local bureaucratic membership, and regularizations. Urban citizenship serves as the normative foundation of these policies because it claims membership for all people who inhabit a city. Regularization programs confer national residency status on irregular migrants. Pro‐immigration actors favor this policy; however, when regularizations are not possible, cities can turn to sanctuary city and local bureaucratic membership policies. It is important for practitioners to comprehend and engage with these types of urban policies since they are likely to travel to cities worldwide.     

Federal policy and postwar urban decline: A case of government complicity?

Abstract

Many urban commentators have implicated the federal government in the decline of central cities in the decades just after World War II. They claim that federal policies disproportionately favored suburban development over much needed urban redevelopment and exacerbated the deconcentration and decentralization of people and capital.

Close scrutiny reveals flaws in this argument and four of them are examined in this article: the core premise that suburban growth and population loss in the central cities are inversely related, the lack of attention to the actual chronology of events, the failure to address the geographic incidence of population loss from the central cities, and the deemphasizing of the role of the private sector, often acting with government support. The article concludes with a brief reflection on the tenacity of the complicity claim.     

Rethinking Local Politics: Towards a Cultural Political Economy of Entrepreneurial Cities

The territorial dimensions of the state are undergoing substantial changes. Political entities, such as cities and regions, are gaining in importance. Described as entrepreneurial city politics, policy-makers of contemporary cities are using new, economically oriented strategies to strengthen their city's position in interurban competition. Despite this state of affairs, social science still tends to treat local politics as equal to sub-national politics. This has especially been the case in Scandinavia, where local governments have traditionally functioned as an extension of the central welfare state. Since processes associated with entrepreneurial city politics are manifested in Scandinavia as well, this article argues that there is a need to rethink what local politics ultimately is about. The article proposes the ideas recently formed at the ‘Lancaster School of Cultural Political Economy’ as an approach with which to reconceptualise local politics. In the final section, some remarks on a future research agenda, centred on the cultural political economy of contemporary city politics, are presented.     

Challenging the representation of ethnically divided cities: perspectives from Mostar

ABSTRACT

In this introduction, we discuss the scope of the edited volume by outlining the position of Mostar within much broader academic debates on ‘ethnically divided cities’. We question the representations of such contested cities as hopeless spaces of division, and suggest to explore instead the cracks that challenge overpowering logics of partition: the self-directed attempts at inter-ethnic solidarity, grassroots movements for social justice and dignity, and the inconsistent ways people in these cities inhabit and perform ethnic identities. We also introduce the themes of this Special Issue; Divided Cities as Complex Cities; Memories, Affect and Everyday Life; and Grassroots Politics.     

Promotion Tournament,Labor Market Tightening and Pension Generosity: A Comparative Public Policy Analysis of Pension System for Urban Workers in China (1997–2013)

Abstract

This article conducts a comparative public policy analysis of China’s generous urban worker basic pension system. It is commonly believed that Chinese local governments, which are motived by office-seeking incentives under decentralization, may foster economic growth at the expense of citizens’ social rights and thus “promotion tournament competition” comes into being. This article challenges this view by arguing that such competition can increase the generosity of social programs such as public pensions, especially in the condition of labor scarcity. This argument is supported by time-series cross-section analysis of 31 Chinese provincial units (1997–2013) using a novel indicator of the intensity of inter-locality competition. When the labor market tightens, workers can leave a locality to seek better compensation. Motivated by the promotion tournament competition to develop the local economy, which requires the issue of labor shortage to be addressed, local governments then provide generous local pension schemes to retain workers. Operating in a macroeconomic climate of labor scarcity, promotion tournament competition becomes an unlikely catalyst for welfare expansion in China.     

DIFFERENCES IN LEARNING PRACTICES AND VALUES IN NORTH–SOUTH CITY PARTNERSHIPS: TOWARDS A BROADER UNDERSTANDING OF MUTUALITY

This article addresses twinning between local governments in North and South, contributing to the past decade's discourse on institutional twinning in this journal. Local governments have increasingly become recognised as relevant actors in international development cooperation through city‐to‐city cooperation structures, which have been praised as an effective mechanism for local government capacity building. This article discusses the learning practices and the extent to which new knowledge is valued and adopted by twinning participants in both North and South and moreover whether learning benefits are mutual. In a study of three partnerships between Dutch municipalities and partner cities in Peru, South Africa and Nicaragua, 36 participants were interviewed. The findings reveal that learning in city‐to‐city partnerships is not mutual between North and South and that the benefits of ‘shared learning’—a rhetoric commonly used in the twinning discourse—are limited. Instead, other opportunities for mutuality arise for Northern municipalities from political and strategic benefits, such as staff loyalty and motivation. Mutuality in twinning hence deserves a broader interpretation than learning alone so that twinning benefits can be identified and maximised for both North and South, keeping cities interested and motivated. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Reinventing the central city as a place to live and work

Abstract

Public policies for urban development have traditionally emphasized investment in physical infrastructure, the development of large‐scale commercial facilities, the construction of new housing, and the renewal of existing neighborhoods. Most efforts to revitalize central cities by building new facilities for visitors have focused on suburban commuters and tourists. At the same time, many housing initiatives in central cities have concentrated on low‐income communities because outlying suburban areas have attracted traditional middle‐income households.

This article argues that emerging demographic and cultural trends—combined with changes in the structure of business organizations and technological advances—provide new opportunities for cities to retain and attract middle‐class households. Using gay and lesbian populations as an example, it focuses on the role that nontraditional households can play in urban redevelopment. In light of the rise of nontraditional households and the growth of self‐employment and small businesses, cities should adopt policies that make them attractive places in which to live and work.     

Innovation at the edges of the metropolis: An analysis of innovation drivers in Sydney's peripheral suburbs

Abstract

This article discusses using the concept of innovation ecosystems to assess innovation intensity in peripheral areas of metropolitan regions. Innovation is a significant driver of prosperity, industrial growth, and job creation. Emergent areas of new technology applications have their roots in entrepreneurial and innovative practices. However, studies have focused on the strengths that cities—and central business districts and inner suburbs in particular— have relative to the industries of the emerging knowledge economy, notably information technology and financial, property, and business services. Most of the time, the peripheral suburbs have been neglected.

The results from a study of innovation drivers in Sydney, Australia, show that peripheral suburbs in metropolitan areas have local innovation processes that require specific planning measures to promote innovation intensity. Some of these processes are linked to local suburban characteristics that might not apply to the entire city or metropolitan region.     

Revitalizing the Parramore heritage renovation area: Florida's state housing initiatives partnership program and Orlando's historic African‐American community

Abstract

Housing programs increasingly contribute to broader community revitalization efforts rather than strictly serving production‐oriented goals. As implementation of this strategy moves beyond the traditional housing leaders in cities such as Boston, Cleveland, and Baltimore, an assessment of other areas is instructive. This article examines how the nation's largest housing trust fund, which Florida directs primarily to local governments through the State Housing Initiatives Partnership (SHIP), contributed to Orlando's ambitious community revitalization effort in the Parramore neighborhood.

Given the consistency between SHIP goals and those of the Parramore project and Orlando's experience with developing partnerships and affordable housing initiatives, SHIP should have proven an effective tool. The initial findings demonstrate that housing programs need to be sufficiently flexible to permit a comprehensive approach to neighborhood revitalization. Such an approach should seek a balance between product‐based redevelopment and people‐based housing strategies, expand the role of community development corporations, and create housing choice.     

Moving Toward Mixed Service Delivery: The Growth in Schools Run by Non-Governmental Providers in Ten Cities

ABSTRACT

The delivery of public services by a mix of government and non-governmental organizations can offer many public policy benefits. When direct governmental provision has predominated, however, achieving these benefits requires building the supply of non-governmental service providers, which requires understanding how to improve their availability and quality. Integrating the literature on contracting and mixed delivery, this article specifies three categories of supply-building tactics: creating markets, buying smart, and managing markets. We then report on 10 cities that have nurtured the supply of schools run by non-governmental organizations. We find that cities’ supply-building efforts fall along a continuum from passive to active, and they employ some types of tactics (creating markets, buying smart) more than others (managing markets). Differential changes in market share across the cities we studied suggest a relationship between supply-building activities and movement from exclusive governmental provision toward the mixed delivery of schools. These findings suggest hypotheses for future research on governmental efforts to build the supply and capabilities of non-governmental service providers in order to pursue mixed service delivery.     

American E-Government at the Crossroads

Abstract

This article reports analyses, findings, conclusions and implications about the first U.S. survey of Web sites of 223 major American cities with populations of 100,000 or more. The national survey sought to provide one of the most comprehensive reviews of, and current and future implications regarding, Web site uses by major cities as well as optimal uses by features and user benefits. It made concrete suggestions for future uses of governmental Web-strategy development. Completed in June 2001, the study sought particularly to evaluate how American cities are incorporating online services into their constituency services. Analyses and findings indicated that many major U.S. cities were advancing their e-gov-ernment initiatives and virtually all cities acknowledged the importance of a basic Web presence. However, a large gap still remained between current practice and Optimal, Ml online potential.     

Legitimacy and Coercion in Peacebuilding: A Balancing Act

ABSTRACT

Despite the tendency of the power literature to analyse legitimacy and coercion in isolation, both theoretical and empirical evidence suggest that coercion and legitimacy are not parallel lines but can interact in different ways, supporting or undermining each other. A methodical exploration of the relationship between legitimacy and coercion is important not only for improving the theoretical literatures on power and legitimacy but also in the light of the increasing interest in the power of legitimacy in statebuilding and peacebuilding. This article first analyses the overall interaction between coercion and legitimacy, and then explores the question that emerges from the interaction analysis; what level of coercion is permitted or required in order for a mission’s local legitimacy to be sustained? Finally, for the practice of peacebuilding, the article shows that an operation needs to understand its initial legitimacy standing with the local population, as this determines how much coercive force it can employ without undermining its overall legitimacy.     

Back to the Future: The Pulling Apart of our Towns and Cities

Growing divisions between Britain’s towns and cities have created a dilemma for the Labour Party in seeking to represent very different parts of the country. There are some who argue that Labour must choose the global networked youth—who largely reside in cities—in order to maximise its electoral chances. This is an argument that defies electoral gravity and fails to address the root causes of the gulf between towns and cities. As jobs and investment have gone into cities, many towns have seen the local population age and local economies become unsustainable. In both towns and cities there is a clamour for power to move closer to home and for the renewal of democratic institutions, offering Labour the chance to win power and end the divisions that have come to characterise British politics.     

The Role of Marketing in Politics

ABSTRACT

Political marketing is an exciting new area. Research produced over the last decade has been pioneering in showing the applicability of marketing to politics. However, this article argues that the field now needs to move in a different direction if we are to reach political marketing's full potential. Political marketing needs a comprehensive approach: it can be applied not just to party-electoral behaviour but also legislatures, local government, the media, and public services, with both concepts and techniques from marketing, and an understanding from political science literature as well as management studies. The article, therefore, maps out the route to be taken to reach the end of the rainbow and the pot of gold that the political marketing field potentially offers.