Explore how cities create a range of felt intensities.

X4084810 Sergio Zenere DD304 Understanding Cities ECA: SOCIAL THEME Sergio Zenere

ISBN 978-1-387-44424-3

DD304 UNDERSTANDING CITIES ECA SOCIAL THEME*

Explore how cities create a range of felt intensities. How useful is the notion of ‘felt intensities’ for understanding the processes of community formation and difference?

OPEN UNIVERSITY September 2010 *

In the present essay, the symbols “” are used to refer to quotations. The present writer uses the symbols '' in order to convey emphasis as if to mean “so called” or “so to speak”.

Submitted to the Open University for evaluation

1

X4084810 Sergio Zenere DD304 Understanding Cities ECA: SOCIAL THEME 1. INTRODUCING THE CONCEPTS

1A. THE BIG, GLOBALIZED CITY It is important to say something first about the main concepts introduced in the question, to be allowed to move later onto concrete cases to show how intensities and communities take form in the city: this in order to appreciate the extent of 'felt intensity'. The (big, globalized) city, for example, is all about “ exaggerations: it concentrates and intensifies these contrasts. -...- jangled by crime, by ‘racial’ and communal tensions, by excitement and pleasure, by social and political unrest, and by unending influxes of people ”1. In fact, urbanization is a reality very difficult to escape from: “by the year 2020, urban population is likely to rise to over 75 per cent of global population.”2. Furthermore, an increasingly large percentage of population and GDP (around 50% in developing countries3) is located in urban areas -with more and more mega-cities being in “the Third World”4. ”The images we implicitly draw on when we use the word 'city' can stem from a very limited repertoire of cities” 5. That happens because the particular 'power' cities as such are about “It's something that is mobilized through their connections. -...- It doesn't necessarily come out in Bamako or Gaborone in the 1 2 3 4 5

Following considerations made about Chicago in Massey, Allen&Pile 1999:41 Pile, Brook&Mooney 1999:249 Allen, Massey & Pryke 1999:248 Massey, Allen&Pile 1999:115 Ibid:10

Submitted to the Open University for evaluation

2

X4084810 Sergio Zenere DD304 Understanding Cities ECA: SOCIAL THEME way that it comes out in Tokyo or New York or London.” 6. The secret apparently rests with ”the practices of power -...- [meaning] what you put together with the resources that matters, not simply the amount of -...- resources at your disposal” 7, or -in other words- the 'unique mix' and concentration of talent, abilities and so forth, “It's something evocative or expressive”8 people should 'feel intensely' about, 'instead of merely observing and recording' 9. Urban reality also “it’s open intensity so it’s connected into all sorts of processes which stretch well beyond it’s conventional boundaries”10.

6 7 8 9 10

Allen in Open University 2005-3:35 Allen, Massey&Pryke 1999:189 Allen, in Open University 2005-3:25 Concept in Massey, Allen&Pile 1999:95 Talking about allotments, Hinchcliffe, Open University 2005-3:18; the same concept applied generally in Massey, Ibid:23

Submitted to the Open University for evaluation

3

X4084810 Sergio Zenere DD304 Understanding Cities ECA: SOCIAL THEME

1B. NOT ALL BIG CITIES ARE CREATED EQUAL All big cities are about rythms, “arising out of the teeming mix of city life as people move in and around the city -...-. Lines of visibility and waves of sound are also forms of inequality.”11;“Rhythms and “tensions have geography's to them -..."space [shall be seen] as generative".” 12, “where the biggest conglomerations of social interactions take place and where they are at their most intense” 13. The evocative descriptions above, though, could apply to any globalized mega-city: Bucharest and Moscow, Mexico City and Milan, Jakarta and Beijing; aren't those cities a furnace of interaction involving a massive input in terms of capitals, expertise, people etc? If so, why do examples almost always revolve around New York, Tokyo etc? While all mega-cities can be construed as 'centres', they shouldn't be seen as individual realities, but as part of a multidirectional international system that surrounds and penetrates them according to certain rules. Only certain cities are ” producers of dominant rhythms -...- rhythmed -...by the social relations of international finance” 14. Even mounting urbanization as a global phenomenon is “shaped -...- by macroeconomic policy -...- finely tuned to fit with -...- the global economy”15; theorists disagree about the real nature of 'power' in the networked city, though16. The shifting notion of 'dominance' is best 11 12 13 14 15 16

Massey, Allen & Pile 1999:56-65.

Pinch in Open University 2005-3:39 Massey ibid:22 Allen, Massey&Pryke 1999:245 Ibid:251 For Castells, power is concentrated in the networked space of flows, whereas for Sassen it is concentrated in those groups who exercise the command-and-control functions embedded in global cities”:Allen,

Submitted to the Open University for evaluation

4

X4084810 Sergio Zenere DD304 Understanding Cities ECA: SOCIAL THEME explored in the case of Moscow: from head of a transnational socio-political empire, to head of a 'developing country' seeking its place within the foreign western(ized) networks; networks and 'spaces' can be subaltern as well: a “subaltern counter-public”17 opposed to the mainstream, the 'subaltern' GLBT and Black transnational networks...

Finally, in New York, London etc we find the same urban ills, distress and poverty found in 'subaltern' mega-cities; in fact, often 'cities-within-the-city' (Manhattan or London's “City”) dominate the surrounding areas much as the city as a unit dominates the network; things are moving further also, as some elites (say bankers, I.T industries etc) rely on “mobility between cities” 18, which shapes “ungrounded empires” (Ong &Nonini) or “phantom states ” (Thrift&Leishon) 19: another kind of community, whose 'intensity' the community at large feels (I.T, banking...).

The internationally dominant paradigm these last decades is in fact “Neoliberalism [that] aims to give universal legitimacy to an idea of freedom based on the individual and the private sector”20, with the State serving as 'enabler': even mega-cities must fit within (and be governed according to 21) the paradigm and its standardized development and appraisal plans that are first discussed, then 17 18 19 20 21

Massey&Pryke 1999:202 Fraser, ibid.:113 Ibid.:275 Ibid.

Ibid.:236 Pryke in Open University 2005-3:20. The U.S advocacy/consultancy group “CEOs for cities” (2010) is another example.

Submitted to the Open University for evaluation

5

X4084810 Sergio Zenere DD304 Understanding Cities ECA: SOCIAL THEME typically implemented by “a whole army of organizational forms” ( for example World Bank, IMF etc )22.

Although neo-liberalism is a ”western-style notion of economic success based on a neo-liberal 'network of ideas' which currently underpins global city formation -...- to bind an increasing number of cities in developing countries to [its] influence”23, the implementation of standardized 24 policies by native classes of technocrats enamored25 of the dominant govern-mentality26 leads almost invariably not to the hoped for “silent revolution” 27, but to casualization and informalization of the job market at large 28, skyrocketing cost of living, the overhauling of the social fabric; in order to comply with stringent IMF and World Bank plans, credit crunches and privatization often become the norm, whence a sharp decline in welfare29 and similar services, and ensuing social ills30/unrest.

According to Sassen31 :”the global economy is a strategic system of power. -...-. it is a system that does not need majorities. But -...- [it] is not about to go in there, 22 23 24

25 26

27 28

29

30

31

Barry cited in Allen, Massey & Pryke 1999:277 Ibid.:210-257 Kanji explains how Zimbabwe finally adopted development plans almost identical to those enforced in 40 developing countries in the 1980s,ibid.:261 About Latin America, Green, ibid::233 A term Foucault coined to denote “particular way[s] in which government is made possible”, Allen, Massey & Pryke 1999:276 Green, ibid.:233 Gilbert (Allen, Massey & Pryke 1999.:268) writes:”“many more [Colombian] workers were working in 1992 to produce the same labour share of GDP as in 1970”.

About Tanzania, Tripp (Ibid.:263-4) writes:”Social, public and welfare services -...- had dropped to their lowest point in twenty years “.

Sweeney, Kubit&Renner (1999,passim) argue that by 2020 roughly half of the world's population will be living in slums.

Open University 2005-3:22-24

Submitted to the Open University for evaluation

6

X4084810 Sergio Zenere DD304 Understanding Cities ECA: SOCIAL THEME homogenise it all, modernise it, -...-because a global economy is not a new universalism, it’s another particularism.”, yet “certain Islamic countries -...-[tried] in recent years to -...- build a future which does not follow in every detail the [western model, by] -...- voluntarily opting out some of the networks” 32 .

32

Massey, Allen and Pile 1999:120

Submitted to the Open University for evaluation

7

X4084810 Sergio Zenere DD304 Understanding Cities ECA: SOCIAL THEME

1C. THE RIDDLE OF THE ORIGIN It is perhaps appropriate to add a few generic words about the nature of city formation. Some cities (such as Rome ) are thousands of years old, yet transited from one network to another throughout the ages (Rome as head of the Roman empire first, as provincial roman city next, then head of the Christian-Catholic network etc ). Others (typically in a colonial context ) are either 'new' (Chicago), or are re-founded (Mexico City) according to shifts in the power of networks.

Even priorities occasioning the establishment of a city (such as timber, ore, fur or gold trade, military priorities etc ) are typically transient (we may have key railway nodes next, then 'foci' in the network of automobile or I.T. production).

The case of Mexico City tells much about networks. As the new normative power of Mexico, Spain determined that the Venice of the Americas -a long-time successful socio-economical and urban project- had to be transformed along the lines of Spanish mentality, which led to massive interventions in the former Aztec capital and surrounding landscape and geology with the drainage of the existing lakes33.

As well, some cities are populated according to well planned for wishes ( the province of New Brunswick in Canada was created expressly to accommodate British loyalists leaving the American revolution behind); most often (especially true in a colonial context) -though- they attracted all sorts of 33

Simon, in Allen, Massey & Pryke 1999:142-143

Submitted to the Open University for evaluation

8

X4084810 Sergio Zenere DD304 Understanding Cities ECA: SOCIAL THEME “bohemians”34, opportunity and anonymity seekers, etc: the city as purveyor of anonymity35 and community (Little Italy, Petit Canada etc).

It is important to mention all this, because even if priorities shift and networks rise or decline, their footprint lasts typically longer: ”the ecological footprint of a city has been defined as ‘the total area of productive land and water required on a continuous basis to produce the resources consumed, and to assimilate the wastes produced, by that population, wherever on Earth the land is

located’ ”36. Brown-fields, ecological alterations and pollution may remain even after the 'hot' years of this or that trade, priority or exploitation are well over; slavery is indeed a thing of the distant past, but its footprint remains in the masses of descendants of former African slaves and related distress; Tenochtitlan's lakes are gone forever, and so on. Everything mentioned this far takes a deep and enduring toll on community formation and difference, and can't thus be ignored.

34

35

36

Zorbaugh uses this term to define an area of Chicago:”It was a poor area, which had attracted younger, adventurous, single people – most of whom were women ”, Massey, Allen&Pile 1999:40. an actor posing as a sick pedestrian in a big city is left alone supposedly dying on a sidewalk, and in one instance when the actor is rescued in the city, the rescuer steals his bracelet. The Human Zoo in BBC 1994 Pile, Brook and Mooney 1999:249

Submitted to the Open University for evaluation

9

X4084810 Sergio Zenere DD304 Understanding Cities ECA: SOCIAL THEME 2. COMMUNITY FORMATION AND DIFFERENCE

2A. COMMUNITY FORMATION Without such an introduction, it would not be possible to appreciate how 'intensely felt' urban life may get, beyond commonplace remarks such as ”the Manhattan skyline remains the icon of urbanity.”37. First of all, 'intensities' are the result and not the cause of community formation. As a mere example, let's take a look at how society was 're-shaped' in this case as a result of neo-liberal policies: “As the head of the National Bank of Commerce told me in 1987:” Women have become the largest private sector in Tanzania, but no one knows what they do” -...-. Urban women thus moved from a position of relatively little involvement in income generating activity, to being, in many cases, the main economic support for the household [through sideline or informal activities 38]”39: quite a change for local society and those directly involved.

In France40, we witness the birth of a 'sensitive' zone in Paris:”in 1971: Citroën was opening a factory and needed workers – unskilled workers, the last of whom were mostly North Africans or Turks -...-. Standard’s Aulnay plant closed down, making 2960 workers redundant in one go. In 1978–79 Citroën shed 1132

37 38

39 40

New York in Open University 2005-1 Tripp, 1997:4, writes “The economic crisis meant that the reliance of household members on wage incomes in the formal sector was replaced by a reliance on the informa income-generati ng activities of women, children, and the elderly”.

Tripp, in Allen, Massey&Pryke 1999:265 Maspero, ibid.:120

Submitted to the Open University for evaluation

10

X4084810 Sergio Zenere DD304 Understanding Cities ECA: SOCIAL THEME jobs, and more were to follow. ”: communities as victims of another transient priority. It is clear that communities -and urban ills- are a consequence of something that the present writer prefers to situate beyond mere allegations of 'White racism and ensuing inequality' and pariah reaction to the same 41: neoliberalism (otherwise put the dominant western doctrines since WWII) is a good prism for a start. Some theorists, though, conclude that 'racism and prejudices' eclipse even the class factor42, while others see “racial segregation” at work behind “every major housing act”43. The lot of various communities varies: predominantly African neighborhoods still struggle in many respects as 'dangerous' areas of endemic crime and social ills 44; Black communities often trigger what theorists refer to a “'sanitation syndrome'” 45, and are shunned even by non-White communities46, whereas Chinese urban communities -subjected to the same 'White racism and dominance ' 47, and in a way a byproduct of the same48- historically adapted more rapidly and soon prospered 49. The same situation (ethnic minority in a White majority, domineering system) results in a different outcome for Africans and Chinese.

41 42 43 44

45 46

47 48

49

Davis: Pile, Brook&Mooney 1999:141. Zukin, ibid.:44 Masse&Denton, ibid.:166.

Writing about England, Smith ibid:161.

Writing about NY, Allen, Massey&Pryke 1999:13; writing about Alexandra, a suburb of Johannesburg, Mayekiso in Pile, Brook&Mooney 1999:195ss.

Goldberg: Pile, Brook& Mooney 1999:162ss Naga writes about Tanzania:”Although it is true that the majority of Africans are marginalized from the mainstream social life of Asians, racial boundaries are not as clear-cut as they might seem. ”, Ibid:200 Cfr. Pile, Brook&Mooney 1999:157ss regarding Chinese settlement in Canada. “constrained in their residential choices and forms of livelihood by the prevailing culture of race. ”, Anderson, Ibid:158.

Ibid.:178.

Submitted to the Open University for evaluation

11

X4084810 Sergio Zenere DD304 Understanding Cities ECA: SOCIAL THEME

2B. COMMUNITY AND INTENSITY IN THE CITY While urban life is equally intense, not all communities 'feel' the same, yet even the 'powerless' have some level of recourse through 'subaltern' or “ungrounded” networks (the overseas Chinese 50, GLBT transnational networks...), and mastery over some counter-public: the once highly secretive but always present homosexual community51 and its web of 'gay spots' in major cities is an example. Yet communities are 'open', too...one single individual possibly belonging to different ones: perhaps as a native, as an unemployed person and/or a shanty town dweller, as a straight or GLBT lifestyler; a unemployed person today may belong to an employed category tomorrow...

Intensity is by far something more than the deafening or blinding flood of sensory perceptions bewildering peasants during their first hypothetical visit to a metropolis at the peek of its daily rhythm; 'felt intensity' is something that gets to people, not just something they 'merely observe and record '52. Going along with strangers amid such polyrythmy53 is so complex that some regard the process as “translations”54. Among many others, peculiar “rules that city dwellers must internalise ”55 emerge in order to walk home safe in the quiet after dark: even

50

51 52 53 54 55

Zhou&Tseng (2002, passim) choose Chinese overseas to argue about an alternative form of globalization that involves overseas connections and rooted territorial activity.

As Chauncey argues in Allen, Massey & Pryke 1999:107.

Concept in Massey, Allen&Pile 1999:95 Lefebvre, Ibid.:64 Hall, in Allen, Massey & Pryke 1999:131 Anderson, in Pile, Brook&Mooney 1999:241ss

Submitted to the Open University for evaluation

12

X4084810 Sergio Zenere DD304 Understanding Cities ECA: SOCIAL THEME such an occurrence may present different undertones for different categories: men and women, White or Black, etc. Furthermore, the same areas/times of the day in the city are not equally 'open' to all categories or communities: some may enjoy privileged access, while others may feel ostracized.

In a perverse game of action and consequence, the urban puzzle is in perpetual motion and community-building (or un-building) never stops.

'Segregation' and 'enclosure' can rise in different forms: on a 'mass' basis (such as certain social/ethnic groups flocking to/from certain locations, and/or trying to keep other groups away or at bay); on a 'private' basis (such as private developers building gated and suchlike communities) and on a 'public' basis, when some authority with normative power decides to undertake massive urban (re)development plans that entail the re-configuration/displacement of significant portions of the social/human fabric in the city. Mexico City is a perfect example: people (mostly disenfranchised natives) leave the poor countryside (under the clutch of crime cartels) and flock to “parachute settlements” (=shanty towns).

The impact of neo-liberal policies determines unemployment and hikes in the cost of living;

industries under U.S guidance shift northwards 56; society

undergoes significant stress (overpopulation, etc) that leads to more crime 57,

“From 1980 to 1998, the share of total manufacturing employment in Mexico City decreased from around 45% to 23%. In the same period, the share corresponding to border states increased from 21% to 34%” Chiquiar, 2005:258.

57 “I mean [people are] -...- scared of going out at night, even the day, there are a lot of kidnappings. A lot of people have bodyguards. ” Rebairol in Mexico City in Open University 2005-1 56

Submitted to the Open University for evaluation

13

X4084810 Sergio Zenere DD304 Understanding Cities ECA: SOCIAL THEME which in turn spurs the formation of gated communities 58 -often “cleaned-up, miniature pieces -...- a compact, clean alternative to the scattered, dirty city ”59 -: one community influences the next.

Theorists disagree about the 'big picture': the big city “should give rise to the spatial segregation of individuals “60; for Jacobs, this very mix of strangers provides protection as ”there is always someone -...- informally policing the situation. ”61. Sennet62 suggests “ difference is firmly rejected in favour of sameness -...- [as] the marking of difference takes the form of boundary lines etched in city space. -...- one outcome is a form of segregation and exclusion which can reinforce existing social and economic inequalities

“. Davis and

Goldberg63 employ the 'colonial' concept of apartheid to describe the dynamics of 'segregation' and 'enclosure' in western cities; others 64 find a correlation between “enclave pattern”,”spatial segregation” and “control techniques” in the blueprint of the western city. The notion65 or extent66 of 'crime' can be disputed as well; some -who acknowledge the presence of endemic crime 67- consider nevertheless public remedial measures (enclosures, police intervention etc ) as based on 58

59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67

Landman&Shoenteich (2002) link the rise of gated to communities to mounting crime rates in situations of high inequality.

Beckett: Pile, Brook&Mooney:147 Wirth: Massey, Allen&Pile 1999:43 Pile, Brook&Mooney 1999:18 Massey, Allen&Pile 1999:85ss Pile, Brook& Mooney 1999:162ss Massey, Allen&Pile 1999:87 Writing about Sao Paulo, Caldeira, ibid.:89ss.

Dillon claims crime rates to be in decline, in Allen, Massey & Pryke 1999:20.

Davis: Pile, Brook&Mooney 1999:142ss

Submitted to the Open University for evaluation

14

X4084810 Sergio Zenere DD304 Understanding Cities ECA: SOCIAL THEME 'Lynchian fantasies' “where the social imaginary discharges its fantasies.”68.

Analysts are also split when it comes to the opportunity and effects of urban social engineering by authorities with normative powers: very similar attempts to reshape 'for the better' the urban fabric are either endorsed 69 or criticized70 according to the political bias of the 'perpetrator'.

This shows how reality is most often 'in the eyes of the beholder'; what some groups see as 'crime' and social ills possibly threatening their lives and urging them to seek refuge in a gated community, others see this way: ”Refusing to -...- [remedy] underlying social conditions, we are forced instead to make increasing private investments in physical security. ”71. Some see predominantly African neighborhoods as 'dangerous' places of endemic crime and social ills, but others see them as 'exciting' centres of 'Black renaissance' by a cultural, artistic and political standpoint72. Many groups love the 'opportunities' the big city affords (jobs, leisure etc), but loathe the 'costs' associated therewith (pollution, crime, high-density, higher taxes etc)73: the same urban intensity is felt in very different ways.

“Ungrounded communities” or “phantom states” (such as the international

68 69 70 71 72

73

Davis, ibid.:141.

Massey in Pile, Brook&Mooney 1999:212, discussing policies of “socialists and progressives” in England.

Ibid:352, discussing policies under Napoleon III. Davis, ibid.:141.

Writing about NY, Pile, Brook&Mooney 1999:19ss; writing about Alexandra (a suburb of Johannesburg), ibid:169ss.

Concept ibid.:255

Submitted to the Open University for evaluation

15

X4084810 Sergio Zenere DD304 Understanding Cities ECA: SOCIAL THEME banking system) can have drastic impacts, too: as an example, Soviet pensioner Stroganova74 believed the slogans of the well-groomed pupils of western neoliberalism, and invested her hard-earnt savings into supposedly high-yield deposits controlled from the Russian clones of Manhattan finance 'experts': her money disappeared...twice. The struggle between the vast majority bearing the brunt of 'change' and a tiny minority of 'new rich' is a staple of what's wrong in Russia. The minutemen of the 'infallible'75 neo-liberal bonanza, the 'new Russians' and their fabulous shopping malls and lavish lifestyle rub elbows with dejected pensioners and disenfranchised, disgruntled partisans of the Soviet model making ends meet shopping at third rate popular markets. Two more communities: 'new rich' -in neckties and upscale office suites in shiny palaces- are excited about making money fast, most often at the expenses of the poor, who live in very modest to dilapidated buildings on very modest wages; 'danger' (and conversely excitement) in the big city can take so many different forms.

74 75

Moscow, in Open University 2005-1.

Notkin (Ibid.) is convinced that the western banking system is state-of-the-art; today's western readers know better.

Submitted to the Open University for evaluation

16

X4084810 Sergio Zenere DD304 Understanding Cities ECA: SOCIAL THEME 3. CONCLUSION Cities invariably create a range of 'felt intensities', which are 'felt' because people involved do something more than merely 'registering' what's going on: The tourist taking pictures of picturesque shanty towns and the disenfranchised dweller necessarily gather different impressions from what is otherwise the same place or scene.

Cities rise to accommodate all sorts of priorities: trading, military logistics, communication ways...yet priorities are typically transient: once prosperous hubs of fur, timber and ore trade lose importance in favor of industrial hubs, and so forth. While priorities shift over time, their long term 'footprint' remains in social and ecological terms; slavery is long gone, but the problems of the African community are still serious; brown-fields and pollution may still be a 'beast' to contend with, decades after the industries that occasioned it ceased operations or moved elsewhere, and so forth. Cities' places within networks also changes: Moscow transited from head of a multinational socio-political empire to head of a 'developing' nation seeking its place within the foreign western networks.

The frenetic hustle and bustle of daily life; the special concentration and incessant flow of people, financial and technical resources: this is the globalized mega-city that epitomizes a well-established world trend towards urbanization.

Yet, not all mega-cities are created equal and only few rise to dominate the

Submitted to the Open University for evaluation

17

X4084810 Sergio Zenere DD304 Understanding Cities ECA: SOCIAL THEME intricate web of inter-exchange that makes it more opportune to consider cities not as single unities, but as (unequal) partners and nodes in this international web.

Since neo-liberalism is the dominant paradigm these last decades, 'dominant' mega-cities (Tokyo, London, New York...) are necessarily 'high places' of the dominant paradigm, preaching a western notion of economic success based on the individual and the private enterprise, with the State as 'enabler'. As a consequence, neo-liberalism is 'exported' worldwide through the dominance of the western economic system, by way of standardized developing plans left in the hands of domestic classes of technocrats loyal to the 'system'. Unfortunately, neoliberal policies are typically associated with hikes in the cost of living, decline in welfare and related services, the casualization of the job market at large etc, and ensuing social ills.

'Intensities' are the result (and not the cause) of community formation, which the above considerations help to put in the right perspective. Moscow, Mexico City, Tanzania, Zimbabwe are all cases documenting the impact of neoliberalism and related international network dynamics on the society at large: old communities decline and new rise, in a perpetual community (un)building process. The lot of communities in urban settings isn't equal: talking about minorities, predominantly African neighborhoods still struggle, while Chinese communities historically rose and prospered relatively quickly. 'Traditional' Submitted to the Open University for evaluation

18

X4084810 Sergio Zenere DD304 Understanding Cities ECA: SOCIAL THEME communities do influence one another, but “ungrounded communities� play an increasingly bigger role (I.T industries, banking...).

'Segregation' and 'enclosure', then, rise on different grounds for different reasons, yet theorists point to 'colonial' motifs and attitudes. Theorists, as well, are divided in their quest to solve the riddle of urban ills and underlying dynamics, although many favor the identification of 'White racism and ensuing inequalities' as the likely cause. 'Reality', is thus most often 'in the eyes of the beholder': as a mere example, predominantly African neighborhoods can be either seen as places of endemic crime and social ills, or as furnaces of 'renaissance' by a socio-cultural and political standpoint.

I certify that this essay is my own unaided work, that any work or material included in it which is not my own has been identified and that it conforms to the word limits.

The word count is 4140, bibliography, declaration and title page

excluded.

Submitted to the Open University for evaluation

19

X4084810 Sergio Zenere DD304 Understanding Cities ECA: SOCIAL THEME 4. BIBLIOGRAPHY Allen, J., Massey, D., Pryke, M., (eds.), 1999, Unsettling Cities, Routledge.

BBC, 1994, The Human Animal, Morris, D. (presented by), video programme series.

CEOs for Cities, 2010, URL:www.ceosforcities.org (Accessed 10 September 2010).

Chiquiar, D., 2005, 'Why Mexico's regional income convergence broke down ', Journal

of development economics, 77:1,257-275.

Landman,

K.,

Shoenteich,

M.,

2002,

URL:http://www.iss.org.za/Pubs/ASR/11No4/Landman.html

Urban (Accessed

Fortresses, 20

August

2010).

Massey, D., Allen, J., Pile, S., (eds.), 1999, City Worlds, Routledge.

Open University, The, 2005, DD304 City Stories, video programme series.

Open University, The, 2005, DD304 Understanding Cities. Audio Programmes 1-4, Open University.

Open University, The, 2005, Final Transcript. DD304 Understanding Cities. Audio

Programmes 1-4, Open University Production Centre.

Pile, S., Brook, C., Mooney, G, (eds.), 1999, Unruly Cities?, Routledge.

Sweeney, S., Kubit, J., Renner, M., 2009, 'Challenges to global green job growth', New

Submitted to the Open University for evaluation

20

X4084810 Sergio Zenere DD304 Understanding Cities ECA: SOCIAL THEME

Solutions, 19:2,233-238.

Tripp, A.M., 1997, Changing the rules, University of California Press.

Zhou, Y., Tseng, Y., 2002, 'Regrounding the 'Ungrounded Empires'', Global Networks, 1:2, 131-154.

Submitted to the Open University for evaluation

21