1. Start typing on the search box
2. Filter the results: click on the settings icon on the left.
OR
Database by tags and content type
Doing activism like a State: Progressive municipal government, Israel/Palestine and BDS
10th June 2019Activism is typically placed in opposition to state practice. Yet, state bodies often participate in campaigns and movements for change, drawing on different powers and capacities, including the ability to withhold goods, land and contracts. This article explores subnational state activism – what it means...
Taking back control: The future of public services
24th September 2020From Barcelona to Grenoble, towns, cities and regions are reclaiming democratic control over vital services like water and healthcare. We spoke to Transnational Institute researcher Lavinia Steinfort about how, contrary to decades of received wisdom, reversing privatisation results in more accessible, accountable and cost-effective public...
In the wake of Sunday’s “green wave”
1st June 2020On Sunday the 28th of June, voters across France went to the polls to decide the municipal governments of 4.820 communes, including all of the country’s largest cities. Looking beneath the surface, all these victories were undergirded by widely differing political constellations. Despite a few...
Radical municipal politics in Latin America since the 1990s
2nd November 2020Gianpaolo Baiocchi offers a historical overview of what he terms Radical Cities in Latin America and draws out some lessons from the past 30 years. Comparing these experiences to municipal politics in Europe and elsewhere, he highlights the distinctive features and charts the ups and...
How cities are leading the fight against climate change
27th September 2019City governments were an important source of environmental protection in the United States from the 1800s until well into the 1900s. However, since Congress passed a series of landmark environmental statutes in the 1970s, scholars have primarily equated environmental law with federal law. NYU Law...
How to prevent city climate action from becoming “green gentrification”
13th December 2019Cities account for nearly 70% of greenhouse gas emissions and many of them are experiencing more instances of extreme weather, heat, droughts and flooding due to climate change. Climate change negatively affects poor communities, women, people with disabilities, indigenous groups and other marginalized populations the most....
The nation state must be overcome
15th November 2018The tension between right-wing tenets and progressive policies is raising across Europe. If victorious in the 2019 European elections, the right-wing forces would undermine the transnationalist basis of the Union, thus jeopardizing the whole EU project. Overcoming the nation-state approach, both downwards (internally) and upwards...
Tenants’ unions: building dual power in the neighborhood
22nd December 2019For centuries, workers have organized themselves in order to collectively resist the oppressive and exploitative forces of capital. From the early 1900s to the current day, the most common form of worker organizing has been the labor union. With the rise of urbanization, over half...
City problems: A fairly true Barcelona story
15th January 2020Gala Pin, Barcelona City councillor from 2015 to 2019, reflects on her experience at the front row of the municipalist transformation of the city during the first government of Ada Colau. Photo:
Cities of dignity: Urban transformations around the world
1st July 2020One of the main challenges that strategies for social-ecological transformation are facing today is the fact that a majority of the world population lives in cities, which can be considered structurally unsustainable spaces. It is thus crucial to discuss how cities can be transformed from...
Municipalism: The next political revolution?
19th July 2018The way that reality is laid out for us at the moment it might seem a bit defeated and hopeless. Reviewing some of the accomplishments and origins of municipalism shines a light on what according to Murray Bookchin pointed out can be a way to...
Coronavirus may change city designs
2nd April 2020The coronavirus pandemic has already changed many aspects of life. How we travel, how we work and how we live. Experts warn it may even change how some of our cities will look and operate in the future. Photo: Zoltan Tasi