Commentary | Open Access
Planning for Planet or City?
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Abstract: If we now live with a planetary urban process (Brenner & Schmid, 2015a), the very idea of “future cities” must be brought into question. Indeed, we might ask whether urban planning has morphed into planetary planning, with its primary charge being the construction of vast networks of urban systems coordinating a global capitalist process. This commentary cautions against such over-extended theories of urbanization and related planning practices. Although global capitalism has engendered profound spatial changes, the concept of the city remains a crucial social and political idea. By outlining the continued centrality of the city to social and political life, the commentary argues for a democratic evaluation of the urban form in order to plan for, and realize, more just cities.
Keywords: future cities; urban forms; urban planning; urbanization
Published:
© Mark Davidson. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), which permits any use, distribution, and reproduction of the work without further permission provided the original author(s) and source are credited.