The Iron Triangle of Urban Entrepreneurialism: The Political Economy of Urban Corruption in Spain

Despite a cascade of corruption scandals over the last decade, the role of political corruption has yet to be accounted for in the scholarship on Spanish urban entrepreneurialism. This is an omission that extends to the broader literature on the topic as well. This paper looks at the theoretical causes of this neglect and explores ways of integrating corruption into the study of urban entrepreneurialism. To do so, it offers a systematic analysis of the role of clientelism in the political economy of Spanish inter-urban competition. Contrary to the existing literature, which at best explains away corruption as a logical outgrowth of intensified competition for real estate capital, this paper argues that corruption is rooted in a political structure that precedes the emergence of urban entrepreneurialism. This structure is identified as an “iron triangle”, a complex of colluding interests formed by the state, the real estate industry, and political parties.     

Aesthetic Dissent: Urban Redevelopment and Political Belonging in Luanda,Angola

Over the previous decade, African cities experienced a wave of frenzied construction driven by imaginations of world‐city status. While these projects provoked new discussions about African urbanism, the literature on them has focused more on the paperwork of planning than actual urban experiences. This article addresses this lacuna by investigating residents' reactions to the post‐conflict building boom in Luanda, Angola. I show that Luandans' held highly ambivalent orientations towards the emerging city. Their views were shaped by suspicions about pacts between Angolan elites and international capital that recapitulated longstanding tensions over national belonging. These concerns were voiced via discussions of the very aesthetics of the new city. Buildings became catalysts for expressions of dissent that put into question the very project of state‐driven worlding. The paper therefore argues that the politics of aesthetics are central to grasping the contested understandings of urbanism currently emerging in various African cities.     

论美国城市政治集团的兴衰

政治集团是19世纪中后期至20世纪前期活跃于一些美国大城市的腐败政治组织。19世纪美国城市的快速发展和外国移民的大批涌入为职业政客提供了进行权利交易的大量机会和条件,导致了政治集团在很多大城市兴起。随着城市政治改革运动的兴起与发展,加之美国社会的进步,政治集团逐渐失去了活动空间,走向衰落。     

Urban Political Ecology, Justice and the Politics of Scale

This and the subsequent papers in this special issue set out the contours of Marxian urban political ecology and call for greater research attention to a neglected field of critical research that, given its political importance, requires urgent attention. Notwithstanding the important contributions of other critical perspectives on urban ecology, Marxist urban political ecology provides an integrated and relational approach that helps untangle the interconnected economic, political, social and ecological processes that together go to form highly uneven and deeply unjust urban landscapes. Because the power-laden socioecological relations that shape the formation of urban environments constantly shift between groups of actors and scales, historical-geographical insights into these ever-changing urban configurations are necessary for the sake of considering the future of radical political-ecological urban strategies. The social production of urban environments is gaining recognition within radical and historical-materialist geography. The political programme, then, of urban political ecology is to enhance the democratic content of socioenvironmental construction by identifying the strategies through which a more equitable distribution of social power and a more inclusive mode of environmental production can be achieved.     

A Political Explanation of Policy Selection: The Case of Urban School Reform

Amid the torrent of reform activity in urban school systems, some proposals fare better than others. The traditional technocratic presumption is that reforms are chosen for their educational merit. I suggest that, to the contrary, institutional incentives encourage urban policymakers to emphasize symbolic appeal. Data from a 1995 study of 57 urban districts are used to compare the fate of two school reforms. The more symbolically attractive reform was supported, proposed, and enacted much more widely, although neither research nor observer responses suggested its superiority.     

Urban and Rural Estimates of Poverty: Recent Advances in Spatial Microsimulation in Australia

This paper reports on the calculation of poverty rates for small areas in Australia using a spatial microsimulation model. The spatial microsimulation methodology used involves reweighting data from confidentialised unit record files (CURFs) from surveys conducted by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) to small area census data, also from the ABS. The method is described in this paper, and then maps of poverty using poverty rates derived from this small area estimation method are shown for the eastern coast of Australia and its capital cities. Further analysis of poverty rates in capital cities is then conducted. We find that areas of higher poverty risk can be clearly identified within Sydney, Melbourne, Canberra and Brisbane. We also find that areas of high poverty are frequently ‘buffered’ by areas of moderate poverty. This is not always the case since, in some areas, we find a high poverty area neighbouring a low poverty area but, generally, there appears to be a moderate poverty ‘buffer’ in most capital cities.     

Urban and Rural Definitions in Regional Context: A Case Study on Turkey

Transformations in the urban and rural areas under the effects of global economic, social and political circumstances have rendered their boundaries more blurring. It has become increasingly difficult to make a clear distinction between urban and rural. This paper intends to bring definitions of urban–rural into discussion in the context of Turkey. It reveals the results of a research project (conducted by Hürriyet G. Ö?dül with Serkan Öngel and Habip Uluçay from Mimar Sinan Fine Arts University, Istanbul, Turkey, in 2007 and financed by the Scientific and Technical Research Council of Turkey and Mimar Sinan Fine Arts University Research Fund), aiming at revealing the degrees of the urbanity and rurality throughout the country, with an emphasis on the diversification of regions in the urban–rural context. The study is conducted at the NUTS 4 level. Districts are classified as “dominantly rural, dominantly urban and transitional” through the factor analysis based on six structures: agricultural production, non-agricultural production, employment, demography, education and flows of money, goods and people. The urban–rural profile of the country is found as rural and transitional. It is possible to observe some areas displaying deep rural characters in well-developed western regions and some “prosperity spots” dispersed throughout the less-developed eastern regions. Then, regional classifications ranging from “concentrated urban regions” to “rural regions” are made at the NUTS 1 level. Finally, the results are evaluated in perspectives of spatial planning of Turkey and entering process to the EU.     

Provincializing Urban Political Ecology: Towards a Situated UPE Through African Urbanism

Urban political ecology (UPE) has provided critical insights into the sociomaterial construction of urban environments, their unequal distribution of resources, and contestation over power and resources. Most of this work is rooted in Marxist urban geographical theory, which provides a useful but limited analysis. Such works typically begin with a historical‐materialist theory of power, then examine particular artifacts and infrastructure to provide a critique of society. We argue that there are multiple ways of expanding this framing, including through political ecology or wider currents of Marxism. Here, we demonstrate one possibility: starting from theory and empirics in the South, specifically, African urbanism. We show how African urbanism can inform UPE and the associated research methods, theory and practice to create a more situated UPE. We begin suggesting what a situated UPE might entail: starting with everyday practices, examining diffuse forms of power, and opening the scope for radical incrementalism. © 2013 The Author. Antipode © 2013 Antipode Foundation Ltd.     

Rural and Urban Crime Rates Amongst Aboriginal Youth: Patterns of Different Locational Opportunity

In the 1960s the crime rates of Aboriginal juveniles in Adelaide were substantially lower than those of their rural counterparts. By the 1980s, this pattern has been reversed. Moreover, appearances by city-dwelling Aborigines are now more likely to take place by way of arrest rather than summons, are more likely to come before a Children's Court rather than an Aid Panel, and are more likely to involve youths with a previous record than is the case for country youths. This is despite the fact that Aboriginal youths in the city and country commit broadly similar offences. These factors may be contributing to the virtual cessation of Aboriginal migration into Adelaide in recent years.     

Livelihoods Limitations: The Political Economy of Urban Poverty in Dhaka,Bangladesh

Research in Bangladesh reveals the limitations of actor‐oriented frameworks for understanding urban poverty that assess household livelihoods on the basis of a household's portfolio of assets or capitals. The narrow focus of these frameworks on households and their depoliticized definition of social capital overlook the political roots of urban poverty. The informal systems of governance that dominate resource distribution within low‐income settlements ensure that the social resources necessary for long‐term household improvement are confined to a small elite. Only through extending our analysis beyond the household level, to explore their position within this local political economy of employment and enterprise, can we recognize the limitations placed on household efforts to improve their livelihoods.