Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin - Urban Sociology

The Future of Urban Studies (with John Mollenkopf)

  • When Nov 12, 2018 from 06:00 to 08:00
  • Where Universitätsstraße 3b; 10117 Berlin; R002
  • Attendees Prof. John Mollenkopf Prof. Talja Blokland
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November 12, 2018
Universitätsstraße 3b; 10117 Berlin
Room 002 (Ground Floor)

This talk is free and open to anyone interested in Urban Studies. No prior registration required. Check our website for more information: https://www.sowi.hu-berlin.de/de/lehrbereiche/stadtsoz/think_drink

Prof. John Mollenkopf, City University of New York
The Future of Urban Studies

Cities are 'back in town,' to borrow the title of a seminar series at Sciences Po in Paris. Signs include economic vitality, choice of millennials to live in urban settings, dramatic technological changes, the reshaping of urban populations by immigrants and their children, the shift of rapid urbanization to the global South and East, and tensions over globalization that may center (elements of) cities and urban regions as key global actors. In the 60s, 70s, and 80s, much of the debate, especially in the U.S., was about whether cities still had important economic, social, and political functions, with disinvestment, racial change, white flight, and suburbanization being key motifs. Today, concern centers more around who has "the right to the city" and how to balance the inclusion of many rising urban constituencies and cultures with the imperatives of economic growth. Such major changes call for a retooling and recentering of the theoretical interests and subjects of urban studies. This talk reflects both on the new dynamics that must be central to this process and the enduring questions posed at the beginning of urban studies about the interrelationships of industrialization, urbanization, and mass migration. It concludes by arguing for the centrality of tensions between the state and market institutions in the new urban era.