Governance in an emerging suburban world

Abstract

Cities are increasingly defined through their peripheries. This observation is the result of what has been explored by urban researchers worldwide. Suburban development , with diverse modalities of governance -through the state, capital accumulation and private authoritarianism -is transforming city regions in an unexpected way. The diversity of spatial forms shaping urban /suburban development is part of a peripheral growth bringing in a new scale for understanding urban issues, the metropolis or the city region. The paper is subdivided in four parts. First, we take into account the expansion of suburban spaces in order to highlight the new urban issues emerging at a city regional scale. Second, we look at framing the mechanisms of suburban governance. Then, after paying attention to the Canadian situation, we compare the model of suburban governance in Anglo Saxon settler societies to other forms and / or models of suburbanization prevailing in other parts of the world. Keywords: suburbs; cities; actors; governance; Canadian suburbs; post-suburban realities. ResumoCada vez mais, as cidades estão sendo definidas através de suas periferias. Essa observação resulta do que tem sido explorado por pesquisadores urbanos no mundo todo. O desenvolvimento suburbano, com diversas modalidades de governança -através do Estado, acumulação de capital e autoritarismo privado -está transformando as regiões das cidades de uma forma inesperada. A diversidade de formas espaciais que modelam o desenvolvimento urbano/ suburbano faz parte de um crescimento periféri-co que está introduzindo uma nova escala para se compreender as questões urbanas, a metrópole ou a região da cidade. O artigo está dividido em quatro partes. Primeiro, consideramos a expansão dos espaços suburbanos para ressaltar as novas questões urbanas que estão emergindo em escala regional. Em seguida, nos debruçamos sobre os mecanismos de governança suburbana. Finalmente, após abordamos a situação canadense, comparamos o modelo de governança suburbana em sociedades colonizadoras anglo-saxãs a outras formas e/ou modelos de suburbanização que prevalecem em outras partes do mundo.

From a Small Village to an Exclusive Gated Community: Unplanned Suburbanisation and Local Sovereignty in Post-Socialist Hungary

“…After the regime change, first self-led suburbanisation and later private-led suburbanisation prevailed (Ekers et al, 2012;Hirt, 2007;Leetmaa et al, 2009). The process took place without planning at the regional or country level and developments were, therefore, uncoordinated and unresponsive to spontaneous processes (Hamel & Keil, 2016).…”

Different Forms of Welfare Provision for Diverse Suburban Fabrics: Three Examples From Italy

“…The notion of suburbanisms grasps the diversity of suburban lifestyles and social interactions across suburbs (Drummond & Labbé, 2013), involving issues of redistribution, inclusiveness, sustainability, and segregation amongst unequal geographies (Ekers et al, 2012). Although the second decade of the 2000s witnessed a proliferation of suburban studies (De Vidovich, 2019;Hamel & Keil, 2016;Hanlon & Vicino, 2018;Keil, 2017b), the analytical relationship between welfare and suburbanisms remains unexplored, particularly in Italy, insofar as research efforts focused on welfare provision in the smaller, suburban municipalities of metropolitan areas are rarely undertaken. Suburbanisms may entwine studies of welfare by investigating the mechanisms of territorial and governmental integration at a metropolitan, city region, or mega-city region scale (Hamel, 2013), and also by facing the misalignment between political institutions and the rapid growth of both suburban expansion and decentralization development that continuously transformed urban regions (Phelps & Wood, 2011).…”

Seeking polycentric post-suburbanization: a view from the urban region of Milan

“…The plural, interconnected, contextual and endogenous characters of the (post)suburban (Addie 2019) result in the in-between settlements registered across the globe in various forms and to varying degrees and patterns (Phelps & Wu, 2011). In this respect, it could be questioned if rather than a shift from monocentric to polycentric patterns, we are witnessing a process of polycentric post-suburbanization, characterized by densification, complexification and diversification (Charmes & Keil, 2015) of in-between areas, resulting from multi-scale and multi-topological processes (Hamel & Keil, 2016).…”

“…With an analytical view from Milan urban region, it is questioned whether the shift from monocentric to polycentric patterns is capable of observing the contemporary complexities of urbanization. The paper stresses how processes of densification, complexification and diversification of the urban in-between (Charmes & Keil, 2015), resulting from multi-scale and multi-topological rationales (Hamel & Keil, 2016), can be construed in a perspective of "polycentric postsuburbanization".…”