Refocusing urban disaster governance on marginalised urban people through right to the city

• In contemporary neoliberal regimes, urban disaster governance typically emphasises resilience of cities and their inhabitants. Marginalised urban people, most vulnerable to disasters, are thereby expected to exhibit self-organisation. Yet cities tend to be (re)constructed for capital, prioritising exchange-value, while the use-value is comparatively under-prioritized. In order to conceptually refocus urban disaster governance on justice for and power of marginalised urban people, we define and discuss three conceptualizations of the Right to the City (RTTC) – institutionalised, Harveyan and neo-Lefebvrian. The institutionalised RTTC is congruent with neoliberal urban disaster governance, but the other two may be used to challenge this conceptualisation. Striving to reclaim decision-making over capital accumulation in the city, a Harveyan RTTC-inspired disaster governance would prioritise addressing the processes of urban marginalisation through democratisation, rather than focusing solely on preparedness for and response to hazards. In partial contrast, a neo-Lefebvrian RTTC-inspired disaster governance would be mainly focused on bottom-up efforts to protect and recover the use-value of the city, particularly for disaster-vulnerable populations. We conclude that a combination of the latter two conceptualizations, expressed through a struggle on multiple terrains involving local self-organisation, formal democratisation and mobilisation of global networks, could make possible a more socially just urban disaster governance.

Ämnesord

SAMHÄLLSVETENSKAP  -- Social och ekonomisk geografi -- Kulturgeografi (hsv//swe)

SOCIAL SCIENCES  -- Social and Economic Geography -- Human Geography (hsv//eng)

Nyckelord

Urban disaster governance

right to the city

neoliberalism

justice

resilience

marginalisation

Publikations- och innehållstyp

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