Overlooked Cities: Power, Politics and Knowledge Beyond the Urban South

191 Pages·2021·3.219 MB·English

by  Hanna A Ruszczyk, Erwin Nugraha, Isolde de Villiers

Overlooked Cities
Overlooked Cities reflects and impacts the changing landscape of urban studies and
geography from the perspective of smaller and more regional cities in the urban
South. It critically examines the ways in which cities are uniquely positioned within
different urban and knowledge hierarchies.
The book unpacks the dynamics of “overlooked-ness” in these cities, identifies
emerging trends and processes that characterise such cities and provides alternative
sites for comparative urban theory. It is organised into two themes: firstly, politics
and power and secondly, production and negotiation of knowledge. The authors
share a commitment to challenging the unevenness of urban knowledge production
by approaching these cities on their own terms. Only then can we harness the insights
emanating from these overlooked cities, and contribute to a deeper and richer
understanding of the urban itself. This collection of essays, focusing on 13 cities
in nine countries and across three continents (Luzhou, China; Bharatpur, Nepal;
Bloemfontein/Mangaung and Pretoria/Tshwane, South Africa; Zarqa, Jordan; Santa
Fe, Argentina; Manizales, Colombia; Arequipa and Trujillo, Peru; Dili, Timor-Leste;
Bandar Lampung, Semarang and Bontang, Indonesia) makes a timely contribution
to urban scholarship.
The volume will be of interest to scholars from the disciplines of urban studies,
geography, development and anthropology, as well as postgraduate students
researching the global South and third year undergraduate students studying cities
and urban studies, development and critical thinking.
Hanna A Ruszczyk is a feminist urban geographer in the Department of Geography,
Durham University. She is interested in the everyday lived experience of the world’s
invisible majority in academically overlooked smaller cities. She utilises a feminist
and postcolonial lens to consider how gendered aspects of cities intersect with
inequality, risk and resilience.
Erwin Nugraha is a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Twente and a senior
research fellow at the Resilience Development Initiative. His research focuses on
climate adaptation, cultures of risk and resilience and urban decoloniality. He was
one of the recipients of the Allianz Climate Risk Research Award in 2017.
Isolde de Villiers is currently a postdoctoral fellow at the Free State Centre for
Human Rights. She works mainly with questions of spatial (in)justice and the role
of law in time and space. She looks at law and cities from a critical and feminist
perspective.
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Overlooked Cities
Power, Politics and Knowledge Beyond the Urban South
Edited by Hanna A Ruszczyk, Erwin Nugraha and Isolde de Villiers
For more information about this series, please visit https://www.routledge.
com/Routledge-Studies-in-Urbanism-and-the-City/book-series/RSUC
Overlooked Cities
Power, Politics and Knowledge Beyond
the Urban South
Edited by Hanna A Ruszczyk,
Erwin Nugraha and Isolde de Villiers
First published 2021
by Routledge
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and by Routledge
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© 2021 selection and editorial matter, Hanna A Ruszczyk, Erwin
Nugraha and Isolde de Villiers; individual chapters, the contributors
The right of Hanna A Ruszczyk, Erwin Nugraha and Isolde de
Villiers to be identified as the authors of the editorial material, and
of the authors for their individual chapters, has been asserted in
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ISBN: 978-0-367-64076-7 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-003-12676-8 (ebk)
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Contents
Alternative table of contents vii
List of figures viii
List of tables ix
List of contributors x
Foreword xiv
Acknowledgements xviii
Introduction 1
HANNA A RUSZCZYK, ERWIN NUGRAHA, ISOLDE DE VILLIERS
AND MARTIN PRICE
PART I
Politics and power in overlooked cities 19
1 Sanxian: re-/un-thinking Chinese urban hierarchy with a
medium-sized city 21
YI JIN AND YIMIN ZHAO
2 The changing logic of urban planning in Nepal: from
informal to incremental 39
HANNA A RUSZCZYK
3 The marginalised centre: overlooked cities in South
Africa’s interior 55
ISOLDE DE VILLIERS
4 Debt and developmental impasse in the secondary city:
geographies of municipal finance in Zarqa, Jordan 68
MARTIN PRICE
vi Contents
PART II
Production and negotiation of knowledge in
overlooked cities 83
5 Intermediate cities as urban innovators: an analysis of
disaster risk management in Santa Fe, Argentina, and
Manizales, Colombia 85
JULIA WESELY, MARÍA EVANGELINA FILIPPI
AND CASSIDY JOHNSON
6 Comparing secondary cities: holistic evaluation of urban
development in Arequipa and Trujillo, Peru 106
CHRISTIAN ROSEN
7 Post-conflict Dili: an overlooked urbanscape reaching out
for development 124
JOANA DE MESQUITA LIMA AND JOÃO PEDRO COSTA
8 Middle cities: the politics of intermediary of Bandar
Lampung, Semarang and Bontang city in Indonesia under
climate crisis 143
ERWIN NUGRAHA
Conclusion 158
ERWIN NUGRAHA, ISOLDE DE VILLIERS, HANNA A RUSZCZYK,
JOÃO PEDRO COSTA, JOANA DE MESQUITA LIMA, MARÍA
EVANGELINA FILIPPI, YI JIN, CASSIDY JOHNSON, MARTIN PRICE,
CHRISTIAN ROSEN, JULIA WESELY AND YIMIN ZHAO
Index 166
Alternative table of contents
A to Z of overlooking
Chapter 1 Arequipa and Trujillo (see page 106)
Chapter 2 Bandar Lampung, Semarang and Bontang (see page 143)
Chapter 3 Bharatpur (see page 39)
Chapter 4 Bloemfontein/Mangaung and Tshwane/Pretoria (see page 55)
Chapter 5 Dili (see page 124)
Chapter 6 Luzhou (see page 21)
Chapter 7 Sante Fe and Manizales (see page 85)
Chapter 8 Zarqa (see page 68)
The missing middle from east to west
Chapter 1 Dili (see page 124)
Chapter 2 Bontang, Semarang and Bandar Lampung (see page 143)
Chapter 3 Luzhou (see page 21)
Chapter 4 Bharatpur (see page 39)
Chapter 5 Zarqa (see page 68)
Chapter 6 Tshwane/Pretoria and Bloemfontein/Mangaung (see page 55)
Chapter 7 Santa Fe and Manizales (see page 85)
Chapter 8 Arequipa and Trujillo (see page 106)
Index
Figures
0.1 Counter overlooking 4
1.1 The geopolitical division of three “fronts” in China 25
1.2 The expansion of Luzhou’s built-up area 32
2.1 Bharatpur in 2015 41
2.2 Fertile agricultural land being built upon in 2019 49
5.1 Administrative boundaries and location of
the municipality of Santa Fe, neighbouring
municipalities and communes and main rivers 90
5.2 “Watermarks” installation with extraordinary records
of Salado (left) and Paraná (right) rivers in Alto Verde
neighbourhood, Santa Fe 91
5.3 Administrative boundaries and location of
the municipality of Manizales and neighbouring
urban centres 92
5.4 Slope stabilisation infrastructure and housing in
the Chipre sector 93
7.1 Poor maintenance of drainage channel in central
Dili – July 2019 131
7.2 River and drainage channel in central, seafront
Dili – August 2019 132
7.3 Informal occupation in the Tasi Tolu Protected
Area (west of the city of Dili) – August 2019 134
7.4 Informal housing on riverbank – August 2019 135
Tables
5.1 Characteristics of the intermediate cities of Santa Fe and
Manizales 87