Abstract

JANOSCHKA, Michael. Urban geographies in the age of neoliberalism. A conceptualization of local resistance in terms of participation and urban citizenship. Invest. Geog [online]. 2011, n.76, pp.118-132. ISSN 2448-7279.

The debates related to urban (in)security, its political translation into security governance and the edification of defensive urban elements have recently experimented world-wide a spectacular increase. This article interprets such urban (defensive) transformations, stimulated by the dominant discourse and centred on fear and crime, as an expression of a global capitalism and the diffusion of neoliberal politics. More than analysing the market impulses originated by multi-coloured, chameleonic and often covered neoliberalism; this article focuses on the question how to think the necessary urban re-appropriation and local resistance in conceptual terms. The text provides a step beyond the long-lasting dispute about gentrification and exclusionary urban rediscovering projects that target middle and upper middle classes to return to upgraded and 'secured' central urban areas. It defends the necessity to promote an urban re-appropriation that inevitably includes the citizens who inhabit urban space. Such a conclusion arises from the discussions about participation, which is conceived as a practice of urban and active citizenship aiming at the construction of real spaces of citizenship.

Keywords : Critical Geography; neoliberal city; neoliberalism; resistance; insecurity; urban citizenship.