Urbanization and Urban Planning in Capitalist Society PDF
Preview Urbanization and Urban Planning in Capitalist Society
ROUTLEDGE LIBRARY EDITIONS: URBAN PLANNING Volume 7 URBANIZATION AND URBAN PLANNING IN CAPITALIST SOCIETY URBANIZATION AND URBAN PLANNING IN CAPITALIST SOCIETY Edited by MICHAEL DEAR AND ALLEN J. SCOTT Firstpublishedin1981byMethuen&Co.Ltd Thiseditionfirstpublishedin2018 byRoutledge 2ParkSquare,MiltonPark,Abingdon,OxonOX144RN andbyRoutledge 711ThirdAvenue,NewYork,NY10017 RoutledgeisanimprintoftheTaylor&FrancisGroup,aninformabusiness ©1981Methuen&Co.Ltd Allrightsreserved.Nopartofthisbookmaybereprintedorreproducedorutilised inanyformorbyanyelectronic,mechanical,orothermeans,nowknownor hereafterinvented,includingphotocopyingandrecording,orinanyinformation storageorretrievalsystem,withoutpermissioninwritingfromthepublishers. Trademarknotice:Productorcorporatenamesmaybetrademarksorregistered trademarks,andareusedonlyforidentificationandexplanationwithoutintentto infringe. BritishLibraryCataloguinginPublicationData AcataloguerecordforthisbookisavailablefromtheBritishLibrary ISBN:978-1-138-49611-8(Set) ISBN:978-1-351-02214-9(Set)(ebk) ISBN:978-1-138-47863-3(Volume7)(hbk) ISBN:978-1-351-06800-0(Volume7)(ebk) Publisher’sNote Thepublisherhasgonetogreatlengthstoensurethequalityofthisreprintbut pointsoutthatsomeimperfectionsintheoriginalcopiesmaybeapparent. Disclaimer Thepublisherhasmadeeveryefforttotracecopyrightholdersandwouldwelcome correspondencefromthosetheyhavebeenunabletotrace. Preface to the 2018 Edition Towards a New Era of Urbanization and Planning Since this book was first published, cities have proliferated and grown with astonishing rapidity, and massive city-regions have emerged all over the world. These processes have been underpinned by intensifying economic glo- balization and the steady integration of major cities into far-flung networks of cooperation and competition. Urban planning and policy concerns have shifted dramatically from their former preoccupation with welfare and redis- tribution, and are increasingly deployed as instruments for promoting com- petitiveness, entrepreneurial effort, and economic development in a world of deepening market relationships. Capitalism too, is adjusting in remarkable ways when compared with the earlier fordist regime of accumulation that was a major point of reference for a great many of the book's contributors. In the twenty-first century, the technological bases of capitalism are increasingly dependent on digital technologies of computation, information storage, and communication, with major consequences for urban develop- ment. In this context, human capital needs are increasingly focused on a wid- ening diversity of cognitive and cultural skills. The blue-collar/white-collar division of labor that was such an important feature of fordist metropolitan development is being replaced by a re-stratification of urban society into a privileged upper tier of formally-qualified workers, and a tier of low-wage service workers often composed of migrants from more economically mar- ginal areas. Women account for a dramatically rising percentage of the urban labor force, leading to major shifts in both employment structures and the character of residential space. As a consequence of these and other factors, urban society virtually everywhere is becoming more and more bifurcated in terms of social class and markedly more diverse in terms of the racial, ethnic, and gender relationships inscribed on the urban landscape. This developmental pathway has further generated new rounds of contra- dictions and problems that threaten to engulf the social order, including global warming and a deepening environmental crisis. It has also exacerbated and intensified underlying structural problems such as persistent inequality and poverty, and has elicited perverse forms of social control as exemplified by record levels of incarceration that disproportionately impact minority populations. At the same time, urban theory has continued to mutate in a number of dif- ferent directions. One notable contemporary line of debate revolves around differences and similarities within the expanding planetary cohort of cities that extends across both the Global North and the Global South. For simplici- ty's sake, we may characterize the ensuing dilemma in this way: Is it possible to advance a unified concept of the urban that is relevant to all cases in all parts of the world, or must different concepts be developed by reference to different geographical provinces, each with its own peculiar version of an urbanization process? This question goes to the heart of urban analysis and theory in the twenty-first century. Whatever the eventual outcome of this debate, it has enormous ramifications not only for our understanding of capi- talist urban dynamics but also for the potential and practice of urban politics and planning. In spite of these changes in the material and cognitive conditions of urban life, the central themes of this book – commodity production, social reproduc- tion, and planning in capitalist cities – remain as pertinent today as when they first appeared. Their scholarly value resides not only in their detailed focus on how things were in the particular historical episode of fordism, but also in their function as pointers to a present-day analytics of urbanization and urban remediation. In this regard, three overarching arguments in the book must be emphasized. First, cities are embedded in a wider set of social relationships that shape the form and character of intra-urban processes. Second, cities in capitalism are by their nature social constructions that in various ways reflect, support, and resonate with the dynamics of accumulation. Third, if cities derive from a set of wider social relationships, they nevertheless are instru- mental in the reproduction of society as a whole. Taking these arguments together, we can say that the pressures of accumulation, as expressed in local- ized systems of production, labor markets, occupational structures, trade, and all the rest, are fundamental to understanding the fortunes of cities in capital- ism. Additionally, these same urban-based processes determine the continu- ing viability of the accumulation process over space and time. Of course, urbanization always involves much more than the broad logic of the capitalist economy. Each individual city is also a center of social and political activities that can only be apprehended in terms of their own specific and problematical logics, from neighborhood formation and institution-build- ing to conflicts based on class, race and cultural differences. And once again, such logics reverberate back onto accumulation processes via their effects on material urban form and the constitution of the human subject. Equally important is the book's emphasis on urban planning operations as reflections of the predicaments and political imperatives that arise as these complex kinetics play out in urban areas. Urban planning is always situated within the framework of existing relations of authority and subordination in capitalist society, and these relations regulate its identity and function. Hence, Preface planning cannot be innocently regarded as the identification and mobilization of "good ideas," or some disembodied "public interest" in abstraction from real urban conditions. Much of the apparatus of urban planning is posited on securing the functional capability of cities as centers of accumulation. This is not to say that creative approaches, innovation, and good design are unrealis- tic or doomed to failure, but rather to insist on accurate recognition and proper contextualization of the constraints that urban planning must always face. Urban studies nowadays is characterized by an accelerating and widening flow of research publications, policy briefs, and conference proceedings that together represent an extraordinary diversity of emphasis and perspective. This is as it should be, given the essential complexity of cities and their pivotal role as localized articulations of a globalized capitalism. By providing an essential foundation for understanding the dynamics of the city in capital- ism, this book remains a durable and relevant contribution to any understand- ing of the urban question today. Michael Dear and Allen J. Scott Berkeley and Los Angeles, California November 2017 Urbanization and urban planning in capitalist society edited by Michael Dear and Allen J. Scott Methuen: London and New York
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