Blockchain Papers

Yescha Nuradisa Ekarachmi Danandjojo, Samira Ramezani, Johan Woltjer

Multiple land rights holders and layered land rights structures create fundamental challenges for implementing land-based financing methods such as land value capture (LVC). In a decentralized governance system, overlapping land rights and fragmented planning complicate coordination and limit the effectiveness of LVC for financing transport infrastructure development. This study examines how different rights holders contribute to implementing land value capture within a layered land rights and multi-level governance system in Indonesia, using the Jakarta Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) project as a case study. In Indonesia’s decentralized system, multiple levels of government apply different planning tools to regulate land use and development, complicating coordination between planning, land rights, and LVC mechanisms. Qualitative data from semi-structured interviews and policy analysis show that overlapping land rights and fragmented regulations create legal and administrative uncertainty. This uncertainty acts as a barrier to cross-governmental coordination and private stakeholder engagement, both of which are necessary for a workable LVC framework. Although a formal LVC framework exists, unclear rules on which rights holders should contribute, combined with complex administrative procedures, limit its practical use. This study contributes to the LVC literature by linking instruments to specific land rights holders and by extending the bundle-of-rights perspective. It explains why LVC remains underutilized in contexts with layered land rights and decentralized governance. The findings highlight the need for policy reforms to clarify contribution obligations, improve coordination across governance levels, and simplify the administrative process.

Ehsan Dorostkar

Applying NFTs to urban planning offers revolutionary potential but raises serious equity concerns. Although NFTs are linked to digital art speculation, their underlying technology, decentralized ownership, smart contracts, and tamper-proof records could transform participatory planning, land-use management, and community asset stewardship. This article discusses how NFTs could decentralize planning power by enabling tokenized community land trusts, zoning-compliance automation, and neighborhood DAOs (Decentralized Autonomous Organizations). However, they also pose dangers, such as digital exclusion, environmental degradation from energy-hungry blockchains, and capture by technocratic elites. Mitigation is needed through hybrid digital-physical participation systems, public sector-led blockchain infrastructure, and equity-sensitive token design if these tools are to benefit the public interest. The article proposes a staged implementation approach, beginning with controlled pilots (e.g., NFT-tracked community benefit agreements) before scaling up to more advanced applications such as dynamic zoning regimes. Lastly, ethical use of NFTs in planning demands visionary public-sector leadership to avert the entrenchment of existing inequalities in the name of innovation. Planners must critically engage with this emerging technology not as eager consumers but as stewards shaping its trajectory toward more equitable, open, and democratic urban futures. The question is not whether NFTs will influence cities, but who will determine that influence and to what ends.

Fabio Capra-Ribeiro, Jéssica Peres, Filippo Vegezzi, Daniel Belandria

Implementation remains a central challenge in urban policy, yet the knowledge formats designed to bridge the gap between policy goals and on-the-ground delivery remain under-examined. This study treats 250 UN-Habitat Best Practice reports not as proof of effectiveness but as a standardized genre through which local interventions are narrated, compressed, and made portable for replication. We extract three focal sections, namely Results, Lessons Learned, and Transferability, apply systematic thematic coding with 906 open codes consolidated into axial categories, and compute co-occurrence networks using Jaccard similarity and Lift to detect thematic bundles, holes, and silos within and across sections. Three findings emerge. First, the reporting repertoire narrows progressively, as mean thematic richness declines by 28.2% from Results to Transfers while concentration increases 4.2 times, with substantive dimensions such as governance, equity, sustainability, and evidence losing prevalence to circulation-oriented themes. Second, formal bundle detection yields zero qualifying pairs across all six matrices, indicating a loosely coupled reporting grammar anchored by generic silos rather than integrated implementation packages. Third, structural holes concentrate at the pipeline’s end, where infrastructure transfer and sustainability as transferable value are the most systematically disconnected themes. These patterns reveal a portability paradox in which the reporting format achieves institutional legibility, making practices comparable within a shared vocabulary, but progressively filters out the physical, evidentiary, and context-sensitive content that operational reproduction would require.

Dilli Prasad Poudel, Thaisa Comelli, Sophie Blackburn, Rojani Manandhar · 5 authors

The decentralization of authority, capability and finance is widely considered to be best practice in urban risk governance. Drawing on the concept of misframing from critical justice theory, we analyse injustices arising from the de jure decentralization of risk governance in Nepal, scrutinizing multi-scalar urban risk governance and its impact on resilient and equitable urban planning. Informed by qualitative research conducted from 2019 to 2024, we ask: How does the (mis)framing of risk governance affect local actors’ capacities to manage risks? And to what extent can inclusive, risk-informed urban planning and policy facilitate just decentralization? We identify a disconnect between risk-management responsibilities assigned to local government and its capacity to meet these expectations. Proposing a typology of misframing, we provide recommendations for the design and deployment of more equitable and contextually appropriate financial, technological and administrative decentralization as a pathway to justice that can overcome rigid scalar jurisdictions.

Yescha Nuradisa Ekarachmi Danandjojo, Samira Ramezani, Johan Woltjer, Taede Tillema

• Policies both enable and constrain LVC, requiring flexible regulatory alignment. • Limited local fiscal authority weakens LVC use for transport infrastructure funding. • MRT Jakarta shows transit agencies need clear mandates and institutional support. • Intergovernmental collaboration is essential for effective LVC in multi-level systems. • Effective LVC needs risk sharing, incentives, and non-fiscal tools for private actors. Discussions of stakeholder relationships in land value capture (LVC) for transport infrastructure development remain limited, particularly within decentralized systems in the Global South and in multi-level government contexts, where strong government control is present. This paper examines the factors affecting stakeholder relationships and how these relationships influence the implementation of LVC. The case study focuses on Jakarta’s Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) in Indonesia, where LVC is considered a promising financing tool. The findings highlight that in the context of Jakarta, policy and regulations, institutional arrangements, and risk mitigation are the most influential factors. First, while policies and regulations are essential in defining stakeholder responsibilities, they also create rigid boundaries that can limit flexibility for local innovation in exploring LVC instruments. Second, the limited authority of the transit agency indicates the need for more explicit mandates and greater support from governing bodies. Third, public agencies need to take a more proactive role in risk mitigation by developing mutually beneficial partnerships with private entities. Overall, this study bridges theory and practice by placing LVC within a multi-level governance framework that links the governance of transport infrastructure development and land-use management. It shows that successful LVC implementation depends on collaboration among stakeholders from different sectors and requires institutional flexibility and adaptive governance that balance national policy coherence with local discretion. By highlighting these cross-sector and governance dynamics, the study contributes to wider discussions on urban development, transport infrastructure governance, and public–private collaboration, making it relevant to both scholars and practitioners across multiple disciplines.

Nusrat Azeema, Yi Li, Sita Chaudhary

The urban administration in Pakistan has transformed as a result of political and economic shifts. The urban government in Pakistan has been influenced by external financing, which is a reflection of institutional reforms, fiscal decentralization, and the priorities of global development. Over the course of the last three decades, Pakistan's urban management has transitioned from a centralized bureaucratic authority to fragmented local governance systems that are shaped by donor-driven projects and conditional cash inflows. An in-depth analysis of how multilateral development banks and bilateral aid influence urban policy, infrastructure, and service delivery is presented in this specific piece of writing. The evidence demonstrates that the use of external financing has hastened the process of urban modernization while simultaneously exacerbating governance problems such as policy incoherence, accountability deficiencies, and socio-spatial inequities. In this study, political economics research and urban planning perspectives are combined in order to investigate how external funding mechanisms influence the capacities of local governments and the transformation of urban infrastructure in Pakistan's fast-growing cities. The findings highlight the necessity of having governance structures that are adaptable and, in a position, to strike a balance between local interests and global urban finance strategy.

Sonia Shahid

Cities are central to climate adaptation but face growing risks from flooding, heat, and water insecurity that disproportionately affect the urban poor (IPCC, 2022; Dodman et al., 2022). Although urban climate finance has increased, municipalities-especially in the Global South-often lack the fiscal autonomy and institutional capacity to access and deploy these resources effectively (Diezmartínez & Gianotti, 2024). Weak fiscal decentralization, fragmented intergovernmental transfers, and limited borrowing authority constrain local investment in climate-resilient WASH and infrastructure (Sow & Razafimahefa, 2015). In Bangladesh, climate-induced migration intensifies urban service deficits, reinforcing vulnerability among low-income and informal populations (Banks et al., 2011; Tanjeela, 2023).

Ehsan Dorostkar, Keramatollah Ziari

This essay examines the transformative potential of Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) in urban environments, specifically regarding ownership structures, management processes, and civic participation. Employing a mixed-methods research approach, the study demonstrates that NFTs can support fractional ownership, increase transparency within smart cities, and promote urban renewal. Addressing legal challenges, technological limitations, and social equity concerns remains essential. The findings advocate for coordinated efforts among policymakers, urban planners, and technologists to ensure that NFTs contribute to equitable and sustainable urban development.

Michael M. J. Fischer

Bock, Stephen. 2018. Translations of urban regulation in relations between Kigali (Rwanda) and Singapore. xiii + 338 pp., figs, tables. Zurich: LIT Verlag, 2018. Hudani, Shakira E. 2024. Master plans and minor acts: repairing the city in post-genocide Rwanda. 258 pp., figs. Chicago: University Press, 2024. $32.50 (paper). Shearer, Samuel. The Kigali model: making a 21st century metropolis. Ph.D. dissertation, Duke University, 2017. Three recent ethnographies of Kigali's urban planning and development provide a welcome addition to a long tradition of such ethnographies, including Lisa Redfield Peattie's famous fieldwork in the planning of Ciudad Guayana (1968; 1987), Grace Goodell's ethnographic account of the disjunction between planning offices in Tehran and the urban settlements (sharaks) of the Khuzistan Development Project modelled on the Tennessee Vally Authority (1986), and Gökce Günel's ethnographic analysis of the disjunction between plans for, and implementation of, Mazdar City and Mazdar Institute in Abu Dhabi (2019). Kigali, often dubbed ‘the African Singapore’, provides a model for thinking about new urban formations in Africa and elsewhere (see Pype, Adunbe & Fischer 2025), the circulation of planning consultancies, and the key social issues of dealing with informal settlements, overcrowding, and rights to the city. Having worked in Singapore for the past decade or so, I was long interested in the claim of the Singapore consultancy, and town planning agency within Singapore (Surbana), to have provided the planning for Kigali as well as a number of other cities in Africa. It was one of several initiatives to sell Singapore's expertise (industrial parks in China; port management in Turkey). A two-week intensive visit to Rwanda, including to its new district hospital and University of Global Health Equity in Butaro, a poor region of the north – both initiatives of the anthropologist Paul Farmer and Partners in Health – in the company of Dr. Aalyia Sadruddin (a long-time ethnographer in Rwanda whose network gave access to several of Rwanda's strategists), enhanced my desire to further ‘read for the ethnography’. ‘Reading for the ethnography’ is my slogan for creating a detailed empirical basis for theory building, evaluation of ethnographic writing, cultural critique, and the transnational circuitry of post-globalization. Reading for the ethnography is the ‘ground-truthing’, or finer grained precision, of claims of theory, just as aerial photography requires on-the-ground verification and often alternative understandings: What is the evidence? How well does the text demonstrate linguistic and cultural competence in eliciting emic accounts? Are there other accounts in the literature, other histories of the specific places, or alternative explanations? In the present comparison of three ethnographies of the same city and administrative structures, I pay attention to the ethnographic facts that each adduces that I can use to create a mosaic understanding of different parts of the city, different local histories of settlement and redevelopment, and different evolving plans versus local resistance or counter-movements of residents, and how the interlocutors and informants evaluate, complain, or take advantage of changing effects of city planners, global financing, and of organic incremental growth and ad hoc solutions. The three ethnographies are not quite like the elephant and the three blind men, but they present remarkably different accountings of how, where, and when things happened, even if at some points they draw upon similar generalizing language about financial and administrative logics and forces. I am interested in the way their empirical ethnographic materials complement each other to create a baseline for further inquiry – on Kigali, but also for comparative work across cities that face similar (but locally different) problems. I emphasize the ethnographic history of Singapore itself to counter the cliches, again looking for the precise ethnographic and historical evolutions in its experience, and the role of the Surbana town planning consultancy in Singapore and as it attempts to sell its experiences and expertise elsewhere. Writing about Kigali in transition must negotiate visionary ambitions and promissory publicity together with ‘ground truthing’, tracking emergent forms of social organization and struggles for rights to the city, along with gender relations, and visions of the good life. The three ethnographies proved to be quite different in focus and evidentiary basis. Stephan Bock embedded himself in the urban planning ministries of Rwanda, and at the Surbana consultancy offices in Singapore, to examine the role of Surbana's master plans and building regulations for Kigali. Samuel Shearer embedded himself in the street vendor markets and informal settlements looking to how their residents try ‘to defend their collective resources against the liquidating processes of speculative urbanism’ (p. 5). Shakira Hudani focuses on three types of resettlement areas to which people evicted from informal settlements are moved. As the terms ‘master plans’ and ‘speculative urbanism’ indicate, the forces are not merely local or contained within nation-states, but are imaginaries and financial forces circulating the globe. Kigali, Shearer suggests, has joined Singapore to be ‘on the forefront in a revolution of how cities are managed, lived, and imagined everywhere’ (p. 5). But Shearer is also an excellent guide to resistance and pushback from the people being managed. He takes a critical view of the master plan process ‘written by consultants in Singapore, funded by multinational investment corporations, to be exported from Kigali’ (p. 5). The ‘world class city’ for him does not actually produce the built environment it promises, but, ‘by activating global networks of capital and expertise with a compelling visual narrative about a city's future potential’, subverts the tactics available for use by the less advantaged city residents to have a stake in the city (p. 5). He claims the ‘international team of managers and consultants have “liberated” planning from the political and economic relations that paralyze planners in other cities’ (p. 5). His own excellent ethnography shows otherwise, or at least that it is not the whole story. Following Michael Goldman (2011), he asserts that the goals of ‘speculative urbanism’ are to create real estate investment opportunities. But, as Bock points out, money is required to build a city, and money-strapped Rwanda needed private-public investment to generate urban budgets but also ways to extract money from, and give ownership to, its own population. As Beng-Huat Chua, Singapore's leading sociologist and loyal critic, demonstrates, the housing mechanism in Singapore built the state through forced savings that the state could then leverage (Chua 2024). Rwanda, too, has a state mechanism to shape investment and growth: the national pension program (eligibility is paid contributions for fifteen years). Construction, in large part, is financed by three state-connected funds (Goodfellow & Smith 2013). Rwanda's political-administrative structure of districts, sectors, cells, imidugudu (the smallest formal unit of a hundred or so households) and an informal nyumbacumi (person overseeing ten households) is analogous to the organization of Singapore's People's Action Party's voluntary organizations and community centres built into housing estates (though not down to the same formal degree of ten households). Goodfellow and Smith provide an overview of the struggle to organize the city of Kigali between 1994 and 2000, and to prevent the race riots that Singapore experienced in its early days of independence and government consolidation. What is often called the ‘Singapore model’ is just one element of planning and design in a complex process of ‘from third world to first in one generation’ (in Lee Kuan Yew's famous tag line for ‘the Singapore Story’) or from low-income to middle-income country (in Paul Kagame's). Shearer, while criticizing aspects of Singapore's consultancy in Kigali notes that the whole idea was that the plan should pay for itself by attracting foreign capital. Furthermore, ‘what is called the Singapore model’ is ‘not because it follows that city's transformation, but because it conjures an idea of what global “city-ness” should look like, with Singapore as a reference’ (p. 131). The conjuring, he says, is ‘what Surbana sells’. It has sold ninety master plan projects in thirty countries mainly in Asia and Africa. These are promissory visions, and become integrated as one layer in cascades of implementation, with all the contingencies, blockages, and redesign involved. ‘Participatory planning’ is a buzz-word component (one that Lisa Redfield Peattie championed) but that Shearer points out in Rwanda today is often really participatory expropriation, letting coops and associations ‘purchase their own property and take out loans to develop that property’, often against the will (or lack of choice) of the participants (p. 139); a harsher version of the ‘forced savings’ that Beng-Huat Chua describes for Singapore. So how did this process get started? Here Bock is helpful. Pundits, Bock says, regularly give Rwanda good marks for economic development and bad marks for authoritarianism and human rights violations. But such binaries, he argues ‘do not help to disentangle the complexity of relations and interactions’. He calls for multi-locale and multi-scalar ethnographic approaches. He watched Kigali develop from 2006 when there were only a few hotels and government buildings taller than a single storey, no traffic lights, and only mini-buses for public transportation. By 2011 there were cleared areas waiting for redevelopment, traffic lights, and larger buses. In the immediate post-genocide years, emergency attention had to be given to the city, of the and and of and is an to the early of Singapore, both urban that the and were and people were into Kigali had and and City a as well as city master plan for a master plan with some from the and The first Kigali Master was by the consultancy in Singapore's Surbana was in to a master and in The dubbed Kigali Kigali as Bock and with a street of and of Shearer is for the he and Bock with real the focus with residents, and building a that had to work there were no real or have had in the in 1994 and the of the a of urban out from a public and into and with community and to on the informal settlement the markets as to be and paid and the settlements needed and use But a master plan is not just a it is a to a new city did some detailed planning for and building In an of of Kigali's But how to Bock to Singapore and in were to Singapore, and In Surbana the for detailed planning of Kigali's and A Surbana was within the Kigali planning (the Surbana of Kigali in to it to the plans and to the an to on as and a way for to from their to their be in the master were about the in the of housing needed and that into or housing than Beng-Huat Chua, in ‘Singapore as model’ (2011), that the model be only can The Singapore government of the and could and with a good Singapore could in the to or in the financial this to Surbana as claims to have planning projects in thirty countries (in and and In Singapore it has create of a In Rwanda, the structure of the political was from the in which the were given of with the to be and and work were not the and in the state to the city was not people their were Bock were in to by were to produce and But in the and early global and and a provides an that in the and from to for the of and the development of this the with and with and Bock a government a country such as the only is that of a that can and the economic some from the and the key was as of the was today in the so, a key focus was to use consultants for and but Singapore, with an that had to become participants in the planning not just of Paul in had a of to plan the development of the country from to middle-income by in 2000, a team to to about of A was to Rwanda for from the which also from countries to create a The Rwanda Development the of the Development of was to as a for Rwanda's in the global of the for The Rwanda The Development and for on to and to focus on urban use and master Hudani argues that the planning of a state is to a of social issues of rights to the city, and incremental of and social argues that one Rwanda as a of urban the was the in when the in a of and again today with the of and in and claims upon of three different and types of development Shearer that three urban are each and the urban of the built and social have the of urban and visual to and housing of are on to with on-the-ground with the people could help such in with in all three ethnographies, but to the Singapore are accounts of to as of a national to human capital. 2000, Singapore funded for and at and the of the or their own have to a number of for and have funded to and and along with multinational Rwanda is to The new and University of Global Health Equity in with and the is to provide for and across the African like the of and of the University of Rwanda in Kigali, were built with local and attention to the Kigali's economic the for (one of the of the against to an and development to provide for countries in the African the first such on the African 2024). also – of the of but to the focus on the urban planning – are of Singapore, this the on and parks on and in was an economic an plan by of & Rwanda, it the from through and the it has through the ethnographies to emergent forms of social and struggles for rights to the city, a of historical relations are a and history that further account of street and of and also of an African of that and forms of are the Rwanda has the of in than other as well as a number of government Shearer, a with a of by a local at and were to prevent from a by a street to pay a to local or community are to and but, in this not only was the but the the city's master which and the for The not only the but called a as the were the the work community the of the is a of produce and sell of produce that they have or on from or and on the in the world in and are locally and sold as in are then or by and as than as or are called is in this is than which there is also a or of into and of and and The street have their own so each or to use the to pay down are single with each and often of making a and by the that pay less than or for and in the some for were to the Shearer says, narrative of Kigali as an state with a that the and of is (p. The the the and The to down for a for a few and then the city, street informal settlements, and are a and and Shearer, the that stake for urban residents in the century is how to defend collective resources against the liquidating processes of speculative urbanism’ (p. Shearer provides and of informal settlements in of were and by the and The had to but only for the not the which it to the the and work people to to what they The residents also their own to the were just and to a new housing by the pension ethnographic is of the or of Kigali are called by their but by of other famous informal settlements (or or are or things and in in the (in poor Shearer is for the and which he by the had become he the development state of was for of the the and could well from the and with foreign and and a of and and In the In the Rwanda from The were by It Shearer says, the of the and for and from the city to out the some to the as a to use against the (p. Shearer the of the street and but he is no that their tactics of and are a real alternative He describes the in of the built in and of other such in an to into new in from their and for than In a ethnographic he describes the of the to provide to informal settlements such as on Kigali. by a (the by the to the Rwanda the residents the for the state the and the also further residents have to to the and for The of capital for that can provide no is not to Rwanda. Shearer at one in that urban development in Kigali about social and about a by a (p. and that this has political and financial resources (in their transnational network of managers and to to their speculative (p. he how could a city be and built within the of Hudani provides of three types of to people from informal settlements to way for new to a new housing complex an urban attracting investment at the of or informal settlement and model a of and shows the of and needed for urban and as with for and and the of and districts, and on a that the master plans residents of were to or their which they had built from of then with and then with as they for the state to and resettlement to to a built housing estate or a settlement to, of their and was really The new were and the unit was the could not get terms from the Rwanda by the because it not as or about to be housing not with they were being housing in for first with people that provided that be in the was for a development by a investment A of property hundred in for a settlement the new to down their own in a of that also in the when the state to organize into settlement and new building such as of The residents of the of urban in as by the the same that the against is from the and to from the As Hudani ‘the political that Kigali's is by the use of the state of to give an of is that the of of urban and to the than informal settlements with and as in and in other cities in which and informal building to political for and into the city, Hudani says, the master plan the informal settlement for investment by transnational capital. Hudani describes as to the street at the and the when there were and and and some provided a social of collective life. As built to leading to The urban of just the and the the of Kigali, and of the 1994 were It has become a new of In the the from the and elsewhere to and to get to work as the for settlement of the (in and and were are Hudani that the of the in in 1994 the large number of from elsewhere. is an urban a of new by a new in financed by with a of by as well as a new and (in a government with and the a and a The and other new are by the of the Singapore Authority The on the way to the is being by it will in A and in other model all and administrative can be has to this also help create between districts, and countries to the of cities in investment and Rwanda is to be the to The was to districts, and were to and on provided and Hudani there are paid by and by the national as well as local are by to on with – to and Hudani called and by the is by cities to Hudani the urban poor are from to in of and with new building and are the poor whose is and for or for and are in new housing and The third of is the model was in as of a Development at first in of a and built of with by the program to the of such were to be built by 2024. is the that and foreign are to Hudani calls it a the is not the is to from they or for their and to was a resettlement for It was as being a of by and modelled on or in in the in the and and had similar as did development state In Hudani or was to Rwanda and other African The was to in and of people from different In that between and a people households) were to imidugudu to the into and to the social organizations of Hudani to the but which also could resistance to state Hudani that experienced forced and were to their own and to imidugudu settlement building materials in The the complexity of claims to and in by people or into imidugudu is not but it the model is an to the and to three it is also not how the goals of are Hudani Rwanda a by from The of the is claims that in of the in and were The of Bock, Shearer, and fieldwork as and a of and processes in urban as well as political or economic Singapore's Surbana was to Kigali, and Singapore an in in of urban in in attracting foreign and in use of of and into not only but also to or both as a and as a while to from or or into and such as and provide into local and as such as account of resistance to and of local points in to informal of Singapore, and can the of and at The the and of the Kigali in a poor projects demonstrate Rwanda's and they can be about He also the as a model for a to Bock shows how that investment can be and to prevent capital from are not only the of housing in social or and Singapore, but also the of social for in 2024). are – and – through private-public or incremental from to as in in and in The is in the struggle and was given the to versus the that try to the rights to the city and the of that provide an urban economic the Singapore but not its social The three ethnographies of Bock, Shearer, and Hudani provide three different the and city’ to about the circulation of and consultancies, as well as struggles to rights to the city, a not only of social but of cultural and social and Michael Fischer is in the and of and and at the Institute of as well as a in Global Health and at He is of ten including on between and to between and and in the on theory as with of and the and in the on Singapore and of and the of and and and on and cities in Africa. He a at Duke University so He has a of on and in and and an with and an anthropologist of Rwanda on as

Andrew Dryhurst, Daniel ‘Zach’ Sloman, Yazid Zahda

The Morphogenetic Régulation approach (MR) contributes to the Morphogenetic Approach by explaining the material and ideational origins of change and stasis in agency, structure, and culture. In this paper, we focus on the expressive quality of ideas and systemic persistence in three research projects. The first demystifies inclusive governance and its adverse impacts. It shows how, contrary to institutions of governance, inclusiveness is not simply a norm but actually the explication of corporate agents’ ideas about rational choice institutionalism which leads to adverse impacts on vulnerable groups and ecologies known as adverse inclusion. The second investigates the role of ideas as adequacy and self-explication in guiding Palestinian actors’ actions towards the deepening of neoliberalization in Palestine. The third explains the relevance of the systemic persistence problematique for understanding how three juxtaposed themes – Web2, Web3, and Artificial Intelligence (AI) – are shaping the political economy and infrastructure of the Internet.

Redento B. Recio, Erich Wolff, Ashraful Alam, Sanjeev Routray · 8 authors

… the right to be counted is a struggle for legibility, visibility, and enlisting; it is a contingent and contextual struggle to lay claims to space and infrastructure in the city. (Routray, 2022a, p. 267). As signalled in the above quote, The Right to be Counted offers a unique perspective into the tactics deployed by communities to achieve urban citizenship in India. The book is structured around eight chapters and guides the reader through an investigation of how ‘the poor respond to the contradictory intentions and goals of various state agencies by either partaking in or subverting the quotidian practices of the state’ (Routray, 2022a, p. 266). It does so by delving into the experiences of the urban poor, who are portrayed as active agents in the production of new forms of citizenship in response to calculative state governmentality. The book is theoretically solid and empirically grounded and contributes to the literature on the right to the city. Centred on the concept of ‘numerical citizenship’, the book sheds light on how the urban poor struggle to be seen and accounted for in contemporary Delhi. Numerical citizenship is ‘the systematic, protracted, and incremental political process by which the poor become entrenched in the city’ (Routray, 2022a, p. 2). It involves the struggle of the urban poor ‘to be visible, to be identified, and to be recognised, and to be made eligible for food, shelter, and basic amenities and infrastructure in the city’ (Routray, 2022a, p. 2). The urban poor's incremental efforts to become visible to the local state are characterised by complex relationships in which the urban poor sometimes operate within the purview of state calculative governmentality and sometimes challenge and subvert governmental plans. In this sense, the book offers a timely and provocative expansion of the ideas of insurgent citizenship and other forms of representation as proposed by key authors such as James Holston (2009) and Asef Bayat (2000). The book draws on ethnographic insights to develop a series of arguments regarding numerical citizenship. Against a backdrop of the daily practices and institutionalised tactics deployed by city residents, the experiences discussed in the book illustrate how bureaucratic frameworks are applied in practice and how communities respond to them. In doing so, the book reveals how communities find ways to counter technocratic visions of the city and the processes that shape urbanisation (Wolff, 2020). These community narratives serve as immersive explorations of what it means to fight for recognition and access to public services for the residents of India and, to some extent, for millions of people in the Global South. The key arguments in this ethnographically rich volume contribute to the ongoing SEED conversation series focused on scholarship from peripheralised places, unpacking the spatial politics of uneven geographies of North and South as well as bringing marginalised indigenous, racial, sexual, gendered and ‘other’ narratives to the fore. SEED, the Space for Engagement and Epistemic Diversity, is an international platform hosted within the University of Melbourne's Informal Urbanism Research Hub.1 Routray's book is an epitome of scholarly work that enriches our understanding of the multiple forms, relations and spatial politics of grassroots political agency in different parts of the globe. In what follows, we offer our collective reflections on the book and Sanjeev, as the author, responds. Using a dialogical format, our respective voices are denoted in what follows as ‘review collective (RC)’ and ‘Sanjeev Routray (SR)’. Review collective (RC): Your book draws on an ethnographic study of three state-recognised settlements and their different levels of entrenchment in the city's political landscape. There is a rich discussion of the complex negotiations undertaken by the residents to be visible and assert their numerical strength. Your choice of research sites—a jhuggi jhopri (hutments) settlement, a transit camp and a resettlement colony—provides a nuanced understanding of the varying processes that shape the built environment in Delhi. The diverse research sites offer the opportunity to explore some of the similarities and differences among the various tactics that residents adopt to navigate their precarious living conditions and engage with state authorities. Your long engagement with the residents in your research sites and other urban poor networks in India comes alive through your writing about how caste, class and gender intersect in the urban poor's struggle for citizenship. You identify Muslim women and the oppressed castes as the most vulnerable groups, both facing severe daily struggles and often having restricted means to achieve socio-political mobility. Your descriptive account also shows that, as well as being spaces of discrimination, urban informal settlements can also be emancipatory spaces. Over time, the caste-specific clustering of houses merges with the surrounding settlements, leading to a more heterogeneous community. Additionally, residents adopt a myriad of ways to break caste oppression, such as changing surnames, engaging in identity-based politics and renaming their settlements. It is important to understand better what occurs when residents set aside their caste, class, gender differences and prejudices and come together to demonstrate their numerical solidarity. When do these differences flare up and fragment the community? Sanjeev Routray (SR): The primary objective of my book was to examine how the poor incrementally secure housing and a range of citizenship entitlements in the city. I show how they assert their numerical strength and deploy various tactics and counter-tactics to be visible, identified and counted in their political struggles. So, my first goal was to zero in on social spaces that provided an analytical anchor to examine the processes and temporal dynamics of settlement, displacement and resettlement at different historical conjunctures. As I have argued in the book, the social spaces do not represent stable categories or mental abstractions, as Lefebvre has reminded us in his work (Lefebvre, 1991). Rather, as I show, these spatial settings are suffused with social relations, which both enable and constrain the entrenchment of the poor in extraordinary ways in Delhi. As the state routinely under-enumerates and arbitrarily deems a considerable segment of the poor ineligible for housing and welfare, the primary challenge is to assert numerical strength and presence from a particular cutoff date. To claim welfare entitlements, the residents challenge state enumeration procedures and carry out a multitude of documentary and inscriptive struggles in the city. In all these neighbourhoods, the poor build varied social, economic and political relationships, forge kinship ties, and initiate alliances with politicians, state officials, activists and interlocutors across the social and political spectrum. Their fundamental aim is to systematically build collective solidarity, even if it is fraught, tenuous and often contingent. Despite the above overlaps, there are differences that underpin the tactics of the poor across these spaces. As the primary struggle of jhuggi jhopri residents is to build jhuggis, gain recognition from the local state, claim welfare services, prevent demolition and demand resettlement upon demolition, the poor routinely auto-archive their individual biographies and the life histories of the communities, especially if they intersect with key social and political events in the city, so as to establish authentic presence in the city. Moreover, in the jhuggi jhopri neighbourhood, the residents invoke the memory of their neighbours and kin if state officials reject their proof documents and deem them ineligible for resettlement. While the residents of the transit camp also fight against demolitions and claim basic services, they reclassify and recategorise themselves as ‘regular’ or ‘legal’ by challenging state enunciations and categories, including ‘transitory’, ‘temporary’ and ‘illegal’ through their unique legal tactics to contest their lack of numerical entrenchment in the city. In refining my arguments about collective solidarity, I have emphasised how the poor deploy their demographic calculus as a significant tactic in their claims to housing and citizenship entitlements in general terms. I have emphasised how the tactic of demographic calculus is preeminent in the resettlement neighbourhood as the residents leverage their numerical strength to contest host populations, nominate successful electoral candidates and assert numerical presence in demonstrations. As I have emphasised in the book, the poor do not represent a homogenous category. The collective solidarity marked by bhaichara (brotherhood) and ristedari (relationships) is often disrupted over material and identity-based struggles. For instance, the dalits (oppressed communities at the bottom of the caste hierarchy) of the jhuggi jhopri neighbourhood (oppressed communities at the bottom of the caste hierarchy) often remain alienated from the upper and intermediate-caste leaders and the language of the court due to their low literacy levels. When the court made a distinction between eligible petitioners and ineligible non-petitioners and approved resettlement flats only for the petitioners, a few dalit members expressed their disappointment. They even casually demanded a return of their monetary contributions as a threat. Often the dalit residents (who carried out ‘scavenging’ and recycling work and earned the least) lacked the time and social connections to navigate the labyrinthine bureaucratic structures to demand their entitlements. Similarly, the purchasers of flats/plots in the transit camp and resettlement neighbourhoods often appropriate scarce resources due to their relative economic power and social/political connections if you compare them with the original allottees. Nevertheless, the purchasers also have a precarious existence because the state may reject their sale-purchase affidavits as legitimate documents in offering housing in the city. Thus, at key historical conjunctures, the purchasers share the vulnerabilities of residents who lack legible error-free documents. To give you another example, the intermediaries who mediate between residents, state and different actors are divided along the lines of caste, gender, class, regional origin, and so on. While they engage in significant activities that support the residents, they often foster dependencies and arbitrary exclusions in their so called ‘public dealings’. Moreover, a stark division between male and female chiefs disrupts collective solidarity in the neighbourhood. Male chiefs consistently disparage the work of female chiefs by classifying various activities in gendered terms. They label their own work as contributing to ‘development’ in the neighbourhood, whereas they regard the work of female chiefs as merely contributing to domestic dispute resolutions. At times, the residents also resort to character assassination and rumour-spreading about female intermediaries despite receiving support from them. Most importantly, the passing of the Citizenship Amendment Act in 2019 has exacerbated the divisions between Hindu and Muslim residents. The ensuing protests against the law, riots and police have the Muslim and of as the collective solidarity and the in these that they a of to proof documents and in their to secure housing and citizenship entitlements in the city. the of the in the this book offers timely Your sheds light on the between the the class, different state and In the court the poor on public by residents the of urban or state officials in the informal these that the urban poor are and who have to the of the and have their You engage with these in their with the of urban in in which a from a and technocratic in the to a and in the You also examine the complex surrounding the resettlement the of eligible and ineligible informal and the of the of resettlement In unpacking the complex politics of in you have deployed and a set of and to what extent, has the urban poor's struggle for numerical citizenship or urban and processes in what grassroots and counter-tactics have to successful against a demolition and in what have the collective not To understand urban and I deployed a to the the calculative in the state governmentality over a temporal in Delhi. As the to urban resources if has to by I show how these have up ideas around class city, city and city So, the state at the have and through and and displacement and resettlement of the In that I illustrate how the poor challenge and of to the of I show how the poor assert their numerical strength in their of a community and solidarity. I have how the state enumeration practices are marked by arbitrary of and and state which and experiences of among the practices often to documentary especially and To these the poor around and engage in of on Nevertheless, the numerical citizenship struggles a of counter-tactics of Thus, the poor and and to in their documents. the state agencies in the poor the politics of and the tactics of the state by the of the Right to They carry out to challenge enumeration and by the state the state agencies reject their the poor their with a host of actors to and their claims of authentic presence in the At times, the tactics documents to authentic documents or challenge state Similarly, to contest legal the poor challenge and of and carry out and around and and The urban poor have social because of the of displacement and resettlement. I have how the and of has to demolitions and social in Delhi. Nevertheless, there are of successful I have how the poor and to displacement the the to the transit camp neighbourhood. The poor their numerical state officials and politicians, deployed members and residents, and carried out including and, most importantly, to prevent the demolition of their neighbourhood. In most of the residents in resettlement against demolition in their of Your book a of not only how work on the in the three sites also how shape the of negotiations and … political (Routray, 2022a, p. for in the of their displacement and resettlement in the of Delhi. It is well in the literature that lack legal due to their and a lack of to urban which them to into precarious relations with urban to secure living to their and often in the city, state often from urban services The of has a on their settlements and of in the city. So, at a it is to that there is for these to claim citizenship and entitlements. you that the urban poor's in is a citizenship is over time and As long as the urban can assert their ‘numerical strength and community (Routray, 2022a, p. to themselves as a (Routray, 2022a, p. they can a range of social and entitlements in the city. Your of the numerical citizenship the a within which informal residents are as agents and, are provided with services in for you for a of the collective and political (Routray, 2022a, p. of the urban that agency only through the of a that is to the (Routray, p. that politicians, state and urban often in their for the the book, your of offers a the informal and the of the urban poor in For example, the the and incremental political in means and means shows how temporal and numerical politics intersect to resettlement and citizenship The choice of the reader to the better and the practices of the poor from the in you show the of and and so numerical power is to these of that, be with of While there is the book on the of the urban it does not from within some of the on or the of the you us more about how this concept on and I have to a and to understand urban citizenship in the Global South. In so I the general arguments about the to city’ I remain to the and of urban citizenship the of In this I build on from the frameworks of James and Asef James I the that the poor build to demand citizenship entitlements in the city. I also on his of to understand how the poor build and navigate in the urban the of the poor do not claim citizenship as and in Delhi. The poor are from a resettlement or if they own in Delhi. the poor do not contest relations in they in and with these relations and the in their they do not to a of urban operate with a complex of tactics and Nevertheless, my also (2009) claims that citizenship claims and are homogenous and While I on Asef of how the poor claim housing and in I offer a nuanced understanding of how the poor navigate the in the city. Moreover, in to the of the the of collective solidarity citizenship struggles is in of India. The struggles of the poor do not merely represent and claims of by an extraordinary of and with to understanding how the poor engage in and local practices to navigate the of bureaucratic and political on an I show how the activities of the poor do not merely contest the state, and the of activists and negotiations with a multitude of in the city. In this I examine an of and to understand how power relations, of legal and historical the Most importantly, my arguments on from concept of political work is important as it offers a to understand contextual of and of communities in I as a who has some of the most ideas to challenge the and ideas the of and an ethnographic offers a more nuanced understanding of the of the character of the the dynamics of caste, class, gender relations, the of and the of neighbourhood As a I have his ideas for their in understanding the politics of the For instance, I do not the poor as merely an to the state I show how the poor their claims to be and with and and legal and to secure their entitlements. In a I offer a understanding of urban citizenship in different historical by the complex and labyrinthine of tactics and counter-tactics in Delhi. contextual and these my arguments have in the of the Global South. Your discussion of numerical citizenship how support informal settlements to their to the city through recognition to or at within the city. with the literature how of residents are as the for even the process of right to the city. For example, in how often to a to and fight to their right of ‘numerical is also in between residents and state officials, with enumeration The numerical strength often seen by both and officials as the for visible in the urban environment and citizenship and, a of a dispute in either on The of this numerical residents and community to their and public recognition in the informal settlements. your account that alliances with various across the social are in to claims in these You the of the members of the in and among the informal settlements of Delhi. alliances with local politicians, political and the agency from numerical strength to citizenship and services it has also that the the have become of such the of their the or to for residents the demolition of the camp is such of of local residents in local people in India is seen as the of important that the of informal residents and local social a in them. In this what is your on how the urban poor in navigate the alliances of this complex social to their how have the social in the urban poor's political numerical tactics and in to the struggle for social and the right to the fundamental in this book is to examine the politics of the poor on their own terms. As you can I have my from I remain to social and as they shape the political of the In this I systematically how the activities of the poor intersect with and across the social and political spectrum. The poor in the political and bureaucratic in Delhi. they develop alliances by multiple of and collective They contest the of activists and and their and with a multitude of At times, the poor the at other times, they reject the While the work of the activists is the activities are often at with I have and struggles and how these struggles have to a to claim citizenship entitlements in the city. While there are alliances across in housing and citizenship entitlements, it has on the of the activists as well as the poor to forge a social in Delhi. is because there are differences among in of tactics and political and and of The poor and their on They from legal and across spaces and the poor have it to a social a set of in Delhi. In to we to on The work is the of of ethnographic this your book shows how ethnographic can be to explore the of politics and the of offers a that the of and the to light on both the local and of the struggles for numerical citizenship (Routray, p. your with and experiences with urban poor communities, your account shows the of ethnographic engagement in urban that is a or of has a for and both new and ethnographic in sense, economic and and In this sense, you on how your and ethnographic engagement have the of and the for can you on the you for instance, in different jhuggi jhopri settlements and your as a and as an of the of the I to build to understand the of political practices on the of the poor in the of the Global South. The ethnographic over a temporal has to contest and frameworks about how the poor and with the state in their of housing and other entitlements on an I have deployed a to develop my of numerical citizenship to understand the political agency of the I have to how the poor contest as well as to in the city. In this I show how the poor establish and their political and to gain a in the city. I writing a on the of my research and I some of these arguments to at a in (Routray, ethnographic I show how I built what conditions I built and how these my I light on the of with different members of a heterogeneous community. I also into the of for the and of and the of of the in the As a can you give an of your ongoing there another book in the that the scholarly and there new you are At I writing my book on the of Delhi. Most of the in and also in India from particular in the state of primary objective is to compare and how caste negotiations and community and citizenship struggles among communities of in Delhi. is different from my first Nevertheless, I some of my insights to understand how the their citizenship struggles in a that the deploy various tactics and counter-tactics across space and time to become eligible for citizenship entitlements. the poor communities who own or resettlement in various social most of the houses in the city. they are not to secure documents that establish proof of to welfare in the city. As a they are more in the and political in their They routinely to their to and support for their political leaders These are as they the support of local to claim their citizenship entitlements and welfare In the few I have in other to with the and other of the I for my research a to my our of grassroots and has to a significant of with the and for the that this support the to claim welfare from the are for the time and of the has for us to this and on the has the

Soichiro MAEYAMA

We examined what happened in the policy structure in Seattle（WA), USA, gazing at the institutional abolition by mayor's Executive Order (in 2016) of the Neighborhood Council ("District Council" in Seattle) system, an "inner-city decentralized" organization. We investigated the support-allocation for this system by the city (Neighborhood Service Centers, staffing of Neighborhood District Coordinators) over years, as well as as a basis for that the shift in the "policy attitude" of the mayor and uconventional city council members,who who emerged en masse in 2015. As a result, a new framework was required to respond to the overwhelmingly rapid and unprecedented changes in urban structure (population, inequality, and housing prices) that hit Seattle since around 2010. The energetic response was a radical-left coalition of radical mayor Ed Murray and a new phase of new city council members, many of whom had emerged as a result of the primary election reforms. A "policy structural shift" was underway that attempted to implement a policy mix of housing policy, finance, and taxation measures, with the concept of housing expansion in conjunction with affordable housing (ap-zoning). In the process, it turned out that in the eyes of these political leaders, the Neighborhood Council's system, the inner-city decentralized system was an old and useless structure to face the new challenges of urban policy and was to be discarded.

Hiroaki Ohashi, Nicholas A. Phelps, John Tomaney

<p>The suburbs of Tokyo Metropolis are experiencing path-dependent, multifaceted shrinkage in socio-demographic, economic, and political and administrative (including fiscal) dimensions. The following two contradictory processes taking place in the opposite direction are at work, namely: the political and administrative decentralization of authority and responsibility (although without much fiscal devolution), and the socio-demographic, economic, and fiscal recentralization of workplaces, residences, and municipal finance. As Tokyo’s suburbs confront these contradictory processes of decentralization and recentralization, they fall into the gap between, on the one hand, policies that prioritize the internationally competitive metropolitan center by the Tokyo Metropolitan Government and, on the other hand, policies that address the growing problems of lagging provinces by the Government of Japan. These phenomena are affecting radical, but barely visible, changes in public affairs of municipal governments on the lowest tier. We thus examine the emerging modalities of intra- and inter-municipal affairs in Tokyo’s shrinking post-suburbs. First, we explore the intra-municipal upheavals, incorporating instabilities and disarrays, of ideas and practices inside a municipal government. Next, we investigate the inter-municipal upheavals that involve oscillations between unification and fragmentation among municipal governments. These interrelated intra- and inter-municipal upheavals hinder the consistency and timeliness of planning and decision-making in the local arena. In conclusion, we emphasize the importance of taming these upheavals and creating integrated governance systems by exploiting the emerging sense of the increasingly intertwined future among municipal governments. This is vital to strengthen local solidarity and promote inter-municipal collaborations at scales that can ensure metropolitan and suburban sustainability.</p>

Valeria Guarneros‐Meza, Mike Geddes

Two broad and interlinking themes have dominated much of the recent literature on local governance1 and participation: the dynamics, spatialities and temporalities of the ‘neoliberalization’ of local governance; and the relationship between local governance and democracy, especially the ‘meanings, potentials and pitfalls of “participation” ’ (Melo and Baiocchi, 2006: 596). Taking the latter first, Beaumont and Nicholls (2008) in identifying new research issues emerging from a symposium have highlighted a range of questions: frictions between representative and participative local democracy; distinctions and overlaps between participation, democratization and social movements in cities; and the tools for deepening democratic engagement with impoverished and marginalized communities in cities of the global North and South. Purcell (2007) argues that there is a need for more and more sustained work on the political as well as the economic dynamics of city regions, and that this means engaging with questions of democracy as well as of citizenship. Melo and Baiocchi suggest there are two key questions: whether deliberative, ‘horizontal’ governance structures favour middle-class and elite interests; and what are the conditions under which participatory arrangements can be both democratic and governance-enhancing. A related issue is the potentially problematic power relationship between elite forms of local governance — for example the influence of unelected local notables in institutions such as local partnerships — and participatory practices (Geddes, 2006). The abundant literature on decentralization initiatives in many Southern states frequently questions the extent to which such initiatives have been able to embed effective and democratically accountable institutions at the subnational level (Stren, 2004; Batterbury and Fernando, 2006). These issues of the politics of local governance — the interplay of participation and partnership, social movements and the representative democracy of political parties and leaders — are central to this symposium. Many, if not all, of the contributors to the above debates position issues of democracy and participation in the context of processes of neoliberalization, and the ‘market democracy’ or ‘market citizenship’ associated with neoliberalism (Kohl and Farthing, 2006). The concept of neoliberalism is complex, diverse and contested, and works on a number of levels. These range from institutionalized cognitive principles —‘a deep, taken-for-granted belief in neoclassical economics’, through consequent normative principles favouring free market solutions to economic problems, to a set of policies implemented during the 1980s and 1990s to promote a lean welfare state, low taxation and flexible labour markets (Dumenil and Levy, 2001: 5). In an important recent contribution, Harvey (2005: 19) argues that neoliberalism should not be understood as a bundle of characteristics, but as a political project, a process of neoliberalization ‘to re-establish the conditions for capital accumulation and to restore the power of economic elites’, and specifically to disembed capital from the constraints of the ‘embedded liberalism’ of social democracy and the Keynesian welfare state (ibid.: 11). When theoretical neoliberal principles clash with the need to restore or sustain capitalist class power, or when such principles lead to tensions and contradictions, ‘then the principles are either abandoned or become so twisted as to be unrecognisable’ (ibid.: 19). He cites the rhetorical commitment of neoconservatives to democracy as an example. Harvey reflects on the important role of urban crisis — such as the New York fiscal crisis of the 1970s — in paving the way for neoliberalism, and also points to neoliberal forms of elite, closed governance such as partnership, which circumscribe both ‘old’ representative and ‘new’ participatory democratic processes (Fuller and Geddes, 2008). In this vein, other key contributions have resonated widely in the recent literature. Jessop (2002: 466) noted how key global neoliberal strategies envisage a growing ‘role for cities in managing the interface between the local economy and global flows, between the potentially conflicting demands of local sustainability and local wellbeing and those of international competitiveness, and between the challenges of social exclusion and global polarization and the continuing demands for liberalization, deregulation, [and] privatization’. Along similar lines, Brenner and Theodore (2002: 369–72) referred to the ‘neoliberalization of urban space’ (or ‘neoliberal localization’) as one of destructive creation in which the old local state apparatus is replaced by new forms of local governance — including ‘networked’ forms of governance based upon public–private partnerships; ‘new public management’ strategies; privatization and competitive contracting of municipal services. In a widely cited formulation, Peck and Tickell (2007) distinguished two phases of neoliberalism in the UK context: roll-back (when a primary objective was to roll back the pre-existing political economy of the social democratic welfare state, via deregulation and public expenditure cuts) and roll-out (the extension and deepening of neoliberal forms such as networked governance, fiscal responsibility and reregulation). Cerny (2008), emphasizing the importance of place in the global evolution of neoliberalism, identifies a ‘social neoliberalism’ in which welfare is not rolled back but restructured and marketized in highly complex ways. Thus: the neoliberal ascendancy of the past three decades has been associated with a series of paradoxical and contradictory ‘double movements’ . . . neoliberalism involves the simultaneous and iterative roll-back of institutional and social forms (especially those associated with Keynesianism) together with the roll-out of restructured institutional and state forms (Peck and Tickell, 2007). While this literature initially focused primarily on the changes encountered by urban institutions across countries and regions in Europe and North America, there is now increasing recognition that the neoliberalization of local governance is a global phenomenon (Leitner et al., 2007). An insistent skein in the increasingly globalized literature has been the call to recognize the diversity of ‘actually existing neoliberalisms’. Larner (2005: 17), for example, is concerned to move beyond neoliberalism as a monolithic hegemonic entity in order to understand its uneven, contested and contingent nature, and recognizes that institutional landscapes are characterized by diverse, ‘contradictory spatialities, socialities and subjectivities’, operating through divergent political, institutional and regulatory strategies that are characterized by contradiction and contestation. It is also important to recognize that policy change can involve a degree of the ‘pragmatic and opportunistic’ (Peck and Tickell, 2007: 30). There are, though, important differences between perspectives which essentially identify variants of neoliberalism, and others which talk in terms of hybrids between neoliberalism and other political projects. In this perspective, many rationalities and approaches are prioritized by the state, which come to form a ‘hybridity of approaches and rationalities’ (Purcell and Nevins, 2005; Raco, 2005: 325), in which there is no assumption of the dominance of neoliberalism (Barnett, 2005). Exploring both the temporal and spatial dynamics of neoliberalization, Geddes (2005) suggests that the transition to a neoliberalized local governance remains highly differentiated. Beyond a neoliberal heartland (US, UK, Australia, New Zealand) there are marked differences between a ‘new Europe’ eager to embrace neoliberalism, a social Europe still as yet with a markedly different vision, and a transitional Europe, itself divided into several trajectories. Beyond Europe, there can be not just mimicry of European/US models, but also very different local governance initiatives, some of which challenge neoliberal prescriptions. Summarizing a symposium on the geographies of neoliberalism in America, (2005: that spatial and . . . processes of state and the of neoliberal landscapes and a but also that is a as well as destructive . . . which for or social emphasizing that such of are at the by neoliberal In and neoliberalization has been associated with the deepening and of market the role of the state and its relationship with its in order to and and 2005; and Farthing, 2006). In no a local been on the social its role has been in with the neoliberal by recent 2008). The spatial and temporal dynamics of neoliberalization can a contested and (Leitner et al., in which of neoliberalism can itself a not as a to neoliberalism, but also of the of neoliberalism by and practices and with (ibid.: 5). that to in terms of neoliberalism are (2005: for example, argues that of neoliberalism to of which are not to neoliberalism and from the not how this While that not is to neoliberalism, in that neoliberalism has the to with such which in the context of phases of symposium with debates local governance, and especially participatory in global from the UK and this to and this and (Geddes, this While and the cities on which of the not of more a of global to issues in a set of very different — including the and different past the global and countries and with both and very different governance and this of by to the literature. In this with the issue of what to the of ‘actually forms of local governance under suggest that such an to two of both of the upon which the process of neoliberalization and other to that of neoliberalization, which are also on local latter in to local governance are processes of with a in contradictory relationship to neoliberalism, as Harvey is one of with in which are in both and in formulation, . . . . . . the of across and when and are In the of this primarily on which to of in local also reflects the that the contributors to the symposium different the extent to which neoliberalization of and the of a of The in the symposium primarily on neoliberalism — that is to in one on the extent to which processes in local governance in very different local not understand a to and the in which both tensions and neoliberalism, and forms of in complex of local governance both and now under — the social and political and and the process — which are in different in the of the The of the state, including the extent — or — of democratic political institutions is a primary local noted Jessop and Brenner and Theodore to the process of the local neoliberal Harvey the neoliberal state is a contested political form a number of and tensions to the between and democracy; in the of the existing social order which neoliberal and extension of between and In to the of and forms of The countries and cities in this symposium such tensions and the local of both and Southern and and and in which the extension of democratic forms markedly different The of the states which the cities are are important in of local governance in at three which are the of the state, the of the local state and its In the UK the countries in the the social democratic state a form of ‘embedded liberalism’ 2005: which the neoliberal has to the extent of this the of the UK state, to the of neoliberalism to on the of social democracy and its in have for neoliberal local state forms and In in the other states — and — the transition neoliberalism has place or state there are also important differences between The states in and very of political in the state to its the was and still is characterized by a level of political and and 2006: The characterized by social that in local political and in the of the of and the of local et al., In in the can be that when with neoliberal to have complex of participation urban In forms of have in the important on local state policy in movements have participatory local institutions by the neoliberal In both and the of neoliberal state forms with the transition from has been a in this still be to In the of argues that in the the transition to a neoliberal urban governance was as was the to be to a new state the of economic and In the of the transition from of its with the of has also with with and as and and is is In neoliberalism in the 1980s in the crisis of an and but the neoliberal with local participatory to its was to the changes of which the neoliberal to the of democratic processes the The a of from those neoliberalism characterized by an of political and has been able to a degree of from its with the transition to democracy, to those its with democracy is and its more It is also as for similar to from political strategies by states with different and in social democratic and have similar participation as of and similar competitive economic The to are in at to the influence of the state in the form of the in neoliberal urban economic and social different social democratic of the countries and cities in the degree of decentralization of political power to the local level governance and in terms of is for example, with the of and based on from across America, of the complex between neoliberalism, democratization and and the that decentralization is associated with either neoliberalism or there is a between the decentralization of power in which has more for local in to the position in the urban has been to with and this local governance in both and is well and In the of local is into the but the to local in in to the of means that the of local governance arrangements is more contested in cities local state is of or are complex and of are much In (Geddes, this local across the in the and constraints have been especially The in the the and of the state at both and local levels. It is also important to recognize the role of state institutions and now an increasingly important role in policy and such as the and its the the of Europe, and international have been important in the of and neoliberal policies different global regions example under the of the which from the neoliberal in and The of governance principles by is for many countries to of the which and to is upon with the neoliberal economic principles which 2007). the key points of have in of what is between and the and in and more participatory forms of democracy and political emphasizing the principles of and local democracy similar with forms of participation, to promote of participation 2007). there is growing recognition of the which frequently between the of participatory institutions and and 2005). The some contributions to for more to how democratically local are and to the issues by Beaumont and Nicholls frictions and distinctions between participation and democratization and the need for deepening democratic engagement of marginalized movements and have been key in local governance, as was the with the in during the and the in one perspective, the of social movements in more recent is a to the of social movements have the political of the by neoliberalism to of the neoliberal state and politics et al., 2007). the of neoliberalism, local strategies have been and social capital to be as a to state and in which and are are in neoliberal local (2005: the is the extent to which social movements have become into a of neoliberal state argues — with many others — that participatory processes such as those in and well more as for the of social as means of that much of the governance literature on a of power an in the power of a in state power, argues that engagement with the literature is the of power beyond a and emphasizing the continuing of in governance is at to that such for participation, be what was on The latter a neoliberal forms of engagement well more social democratic local is also is to such local participatory initiatives the of neoliberalism and neoliberal local In for example, on such initiatives is with that on economic In the context of the UK, the New for across by the New have no on the economic context of economic in one such participatory processes can be as one in a ‘social neoliberalism’ primarily class to social be more to the of state policy in with on the of the neoliberal state, in to which such participatory social are of be from and In this the of the latter for a local state are The of and are also of the way in which social can be local state which are to and by the central state, in a relationship as et is . . . are to to of but are to to neoliberal A very different is in the local social movements of the and are in and at from the assumption that is by the state, to influence local state policy is in a context of social and at the of the local and (2007) the of of and engagement in as to both and the These very different be the for local social movements of a position which is both and the state — in a position in which can influence the state in The challenge to social movements has (2007) to that should to participation in institutions such as local which that such an engagement is — such as participatory in — to have on the of local social movements with a local to and with or in the of from in countries the UK, social demands to be into a and increasingly by the local state there are still important — such as in and — of participation in a range of forms of across local and global which or by the In the of many social movements both in communities and in urban both with a of to the state, has not social movements to but has to form the for of the neoliberal and 2007). governance has the on social movements to to the of partnerships and forms of neoliberal participation, and in so has to the participation of the 1980s in countries such as and beyond 2005; 2007). others 2005; and Farthing, and the not but to forms of and to forms of political participation by the not an neoliberal practices of the of neoliberal institutions by in very different by different or local governance has increasingly the of the has been the of the power and of local and political The of and political parties via local has been by and has been with participative and forms of local democratic The of partnerships has to local to the of one many the primary in local political leaders have been on the one to become more and on the other to new based on the of political and more on or in a In countries such as the UK, local political is increasingly concerned with in the of the different a the and of local political has been as important in and to from of and 2005). local is not to the political leaders in cities in and have also this to power et al., with as and The of and in have local and public to with the creation of new forms of and such as and participation There is much though, of by political leaders in the by and the of which have the of also local of is the local of the literature on local suggests in the context of a neoliberal local politics of governance, should be or the contributions of local leaders from and In some countries has been that local political has to from a to a range of different in a more democratic (Melo and Baiocchi, can also be the that and of old have of in many of America, the of leaders still remains In for example, the of as has the of and that remains between the of political and of a politics in which and in some countries such as the UK, policies have to promote the importance of in one as a way to local democratic and and 2005). the which is one in which local and parties — of both and and in countries — have to of the new of local governance, but in the process different and to governance such as the by of political parties of partnerships in which theoretical of and the and competitive of local this through the example of the in which in the 1980s a more for the of the the city the and as the the that has been to the city and the urban the political of the by the in In America, both and parties have been concerned with and effective While is the that the of has been more in including and social and the that neoliberal can local participatory structures which new to local not be The of the and policies in and how the process of a between the of a a social and the social as well as across and can have for the of local the of a policy or either the or to a different can also a in the of governance of the political in The of the participatory process from to other but also to many cities is the example of how local can the of a governance et al., 2008). and the global urban the important spatial of the economic and social across the by the neoliberal a set of that local that by the the urban of In that the of Europe, North and and the be the and be with and the and the regions the in between and 2007). In the of and These are local governance in an increasingly and has been with urban governance an of the extension and of urban as a of and with the of in strategies to a global competitive are a more competitive and local have to place and new forms of local but have also for new strategies of social and place policies have been by the creation of and and with other cities the and the Southern et al., 2006). cities are the international and are not at the of the global urban but are cities at the level of the that is a dominated by the city of the and important at a level the power of of the global and the initiatives which have been are a continuing of local governance In and in a context of strategies have the a city and of old the for the of 2006). the urban influence the extent to which different cities strategies the local governance in terms of the of institutions and from and beyond and the of and across different the of local governance institutions to to is also by the of the other three which cities have example, of of between the and levels. the of and have as much in with the of as with the in to global changes in and which of and that level cities have and social and are highly in and and have governance the of in and is much in the of urban governance to such is more and some strategies of social by the state — such as participatory participation, partnerships and social — have become to urban social 2004; and many of have been by social movements and forms of other more and also the of the and in cities and of in the the of communities in and 2004; 2004; and increasing in the North are other such as in the UK, which have and spatial on marginalized 2004; this is a that has been associated with and the economic and social The has the role of as a to the of the at the as the has to policies in political in have to institutions and of as a way of a democratic and and this In and political of both and have in the of based on to partnerships and in this symposium are emphasizing the urban is also important to recognize the of In the between the and many of the social movements of should that the is not with social The of movements in in the 1990s and of this have been central to to neoliberalism, and have in structures in urban as a of (Kohl and Farthing, 2006). the of as well as urban local governance the importance of of the of the of has been to a in which very different and urban have been to to a political that and have become of ‘new and the processes change in both how and to local governance in city in and ways. The key between the two cities was the political context in by the transition from the to a democratic that of urban governance, characterized by decentralization and a of participation, was from The on of to two the governance that a of state and and across to a of not a of state that an in participation not an in on and the for local governance of a at the urban those related to issues such as or urban which call and to the on the of the for the urban and the of neoliberalism in the to with the state, a more especially for cities in to a more for In this the importance of as the of public at the subnational and the central place of or in the urban and for In the Geddes suggests that is to the of two of local governance — neoliberal and is not to or the diversity of existing but to to the terms of He reflects on local governance in in the 1980s and 1990s a for the new neoliberal but now a of as a of the recent of the the of the neoliberal on He suggests a of and of neoliberalism is in the tensions and complex temporalities of the between neoliberalism and to in and

Valeria Guarneros‐Meza

Abstract The analysis of urban governance in terms of networks, as developed in the UK by scholars including Rhodes and Stoker, can be applied to a context such as Mexico if due weight is given to macro‐level processes. In this article, careful attention is paid to the institutional legacies of Mexico's past authoritarian regime and how they are challenged by a new discourse of neoliberalization, decentralization and democratization. Corporatism, social segmentation and organizational fragmentation in the past have resulted in the continuing importance of hierarchical modes of governance alongside networks. Case studies of the public–private partnerships involved in the regeneration of the historic centres of Querétaro and San Luis Potosí show that new forms of governance entail a mix of continuity and change. Regeneration partnerships were initiated and largely funded by the local state, with the state retaining considerable power. Most of the non‐state participants were drawn from the old aristocracy and business and professional organizations, whilst the increasingly autonomous groups of street traders and ‘ordinary’ citizens concerned with the life in the city centre were excluded. Nevertheless, new discourses challenge the institutional legacies of the past, encouraging institutional change. Résumé L'analyse de la gouvernance urbaine en termes de réseaux, telle que des chercheurs comme Rhodes et Stoker la présentent au Royaume‐Uni, est applicable au contexte mexicain si on pondère correctement les macro‐processus. Une attention particulière est accordée ici aux héritages institutionnels du régime autoritaire qu'a connu le Mexique, et à la façon dont ils sont remis en cause par un discours nouveau de néolibéralisation, décentralisation et démocratisation. Dans le passé, corporatisme, segmentation sociale et fragmentation des organisations ont donné une importance constante aux modes de gouvernance hiérarchisés en parallèle aux réseaux. D'après des études de cas de partenariats public‐privé portant sur des projets de régénération des centres historiques de Querétaro et de San Luis Potosí, de nouvelles formes de gouvernance génèrent un mélange de continuité et de changement. Les partenariats liés à la régénération de quartiers ont été lancés et en grande partie financés par l'État local, l'État gardant une emprise considérable. Hormis l'État, les participants étaient issus, par la plupart, de la vieille aristocratie, ainsi que des milieux commerciaux et professionnels, alors qu'étaient exclus les groupes de plus en plus autonomes des marchands ambulants et des citoyens ‘ordinaires’ concernés par la vie dans le centre‐ville. Néanmoins les nouveaux discours, qui remettent en question les héritages institutionnels du passé, encouragent à une évolution des institutions.