Southern urban theories
In the current state of affairs, the high interest and recognized need of generation of urban theories from the so-called global South viewpoint is wide spread and address from various perspectives. Approaches to the creation of new theories from the global South are diverse in form and in objectives and goals. Therefore, it is relevant to look in the diverse ways of understanding the importance of Southern Urbanism theories and contrast their views on what southern theories must be for and for whom. Which contexts should they be based on and respond to and what kind of problems should they revolve around?
In this review the perspectives on southern urbanism theories exposed in Vanessa Watson’s Seeing from the South: Refocusing Urban Planning on the Globe’s Central Urban Issues and Seth Schindler’s Towards a paradigm of Southern urbanism will be contrasted and discuss. Both authors reflect on the inefficiency of urban theories traditionally based and generated in the global North and allege the need of the generation of urban theories from the global South but the reasons behind this need are different and even contradictory.
On the view of Watson, theories from the South are needed because solving and understanding core urban problems from a southern perspective might be useful for urban planning approaches at a world scale. Considering the global South as the world region concentrating a higher rate and scale of urban growth, and having accentuated urban problems due to issues such as climate change and the problematics around urban poor population and inequality, having answers from this context and expecting them to inform and reshape global urban theories and planning practices seems a suitable and positive approach.
This means she answers to the questions: How to look the urban planetary situation and problems from a southern perspective? How to think planetary from southern reflections?
In other words, she looks at the global South as the source for new contemporary theories and revisions of concepts for a worldwide application.
Watson also advances in this view bringing as a way of going beyond the conventional planning theory through the idea of a “Clash of rationalities” happening mainly in the global South but not limited to it, a clash between the dynamics of the governing systems and the dynamics of the marginalized population tied to the informality logics (Watson 2009). She focuses as well in the relationships between both of them and the spaces and practices in which they both overlay and intertwine.
From another view, Schindler states the global South city is “a distinctive type of human settlement” (Schindler 2017), totally different from the global North city, which is the reason why theories generated in the global North will never work for the global South. In the author’s view, not even concepts such as Brenner and Schmid’s “planetary urbanization” are useful for the understanding of the global South, for it is still ignoring southern cities characteristics and it can be a risk concept as it states as a planetary one keeping a northern context focus and base. Besides, he is also critical on postcolonial urbanism considering it has not been able to really enunciate how Southern cities differ from the Northern ones.
Schindler sticks to Scott view in which “theory should be situated within the ‘problem-space’ of the present and offer answers for the future” (Schindler 2017), and argues the reason behind the relevance and importance of urban theories from the global South is for it to respond to its own characteristics, urban questions and problems, which are not the same as the ones in the global North. In this occasion, the author tries to answer the questions: How to think about the global South from the global south itself and develop theories for its specific concerns and main problems? How to comprehend the global South context without portraying it as an environment in need for global North development intervention?
Even though both authors acknowledge urban south core issues, through the characterization of the countering rationalities and the tendencies, each of them has a different goal for urban theory from the South to emerge and thrive. Schindler, stating that cities from the global South are a totally different and distinctive type of settlements that need a theory from its context that would just focus on it, gives a high push to the understanding of complex dynamics that traditional theories have not covered or comprehend but risks a lot as well. By stating global South and North having totally different “problem-space” that should then be responded with totally different theories, an opportunity to sharing views and complementing theories around core urban problems that might be present worldwide, could be lost.
While a more flexible view will come from Watson statements, in which a global South focus also brings a lot into the comprehension of urban phenomena not widely studied by the traditional theories and, additionally, it is presented as a way to challenge the traditional global North theories views and assumptions that are not applicable to global South and perhaps no longer current or true nor for the global North as well. A global South perspective urban theory is then presented as an opportunity for evolve in planetary urban theories as a whole, it makes it relevant for everyone putting on it the seed for moving forward in urban planning approaches, moving forward in new ways of tackling central urban issues.
Therefore, Watson’s perspective might be a more flexible one. Despite they both see the problem of a contemporary theory focused in the global North because it might be not relevant for the growing urban world in the global south and will keep accentuating traditional patterns, Watson’s goals build on the relationships existing at a world scale by attending first the complex unattended issues in the global South urban context from within it.
With this article, Schindler also tries to sum up to the characterization of the southern city and moves forward on it bring a set of three tendencies on global South cities a starting for more city focused studies in the South context, considering the differences that exist between them. The three tendencies highlighted are the disconnection between capital and labor, the discontinuous and dynamic metabolic configurations, and the fact that political economy does not cover the totality of the urban processes.
References
Watson, V. (2009) Seeing from the South: Refocusing Urban Planning on the Globe’s Central Urban Issues. Urban Studies, 46(11), pp. 2259–2275.
Schindler, S. (2017) Towards a paradigm of Southern urbanism. City: analysis of urban trends, culture, theory, policy, action, 21 (1), pp. 47-64.
Southern urban
theories
In the current state of affairs, the high interest and recognized need of generation of urban theories from the so-called global South viewpoint is wide spread and address from various perspectives. Approaches to the creation of new theories from the global South are diverse in form and in objectives and goals. Therefore, it is relevant to look in the diverse ways of understanding the importance of Southern Urbanism theories and contrast their views on what southern theories must be for and for whom. Which contexts should they be based on and respond to and what kind of problems should they revolve around?
In this review the perspectives on southern urbanism theories exposed in Vanessa Watson’s Seeing from the South: Refocusing Urban Planning on the Globe’s Central Urban Issues and Seth Schindler’s Towards a paradigm of Southern urbanism will be contrasted and discuss. Both authors reflect on the inefficiency of urban theories traditionally based and generated in the global North and allege the need of the generation of urban theories from the global South but the reasons behind this need are different and even contradictory.
On the view of Watson, theories from the South are needed because solving and understanding core urban problems from a southern perspective might be useful for urban planning approaches at a world scale. Considering the global South as the world region concentrating a higher rate and scale of urban growth, and having accentuated urban problems due to issues such as climate change and the problematics around urban poor population and inequality, having answers from this context and expecting them to inform and reshape global urban theories and planning practices seems a suitable and positive approach.
This means she answers to the questions: How to look the urban planetary situation and problems from a southern perspective? How to think planetary from southern reflections?
In other words, she looks at the global South as the source for new contemporary theories and revisions of concepts for a worldwide application.
Schindler sticks to Scott view in which “theory should be situated within the ‘problem-space’ of the present and offer answers for the future” (Schindler 2017), and argues the reason behind the relevance and importance of urban theories from the global South is for it to respond to its own characteristics, urban questions and problems, which are not the same as the ones in the global North. In this occasion, the author tries to answer the questions: How to think about the global South from the global south itself and develop theories for its specific concerns and main problems? How to comprehend the global South context without portraying it as an environment in need for global North development intervention?
Even though both authors acknowledge urban south core issues, through the characterization of the countering rationalities and the tendencies, each of them has a different goal for urban theory from the South to emerge and thrive. Schindler, stating that cities from the global South are a totally different and distinctive type of settlements that need a theory from its context that would just focus on it, gives a high push to the understanding of complex dynamics that traditional theories have not covered or comprehend but risks a lot as well. By stating global South and North having totally different “problem-space” that should then be responded with totally different theories, an opportunity to sharing views and complementing theories around core urban problems that might be present worldwide, could be lost.
While a more flexible view will come from Watson statements, in which a global South focus also brings a lot into the comprehension of urban phenomena not widely studied by the traditional theories and, additionally, it is presented as a way to challenge the traditional global North theories views and assumptions that are not applicable to global South and perhaps no longer current or true nor for the global North as well. A global South perspective urban theory is then presented as an opportunity for evolve in planetary urban theories as a whole, it makes it relevant for everyone putting on it the seed for moving forward in urban planning approaches, moving forward in new ways of tackling central urban issues.
Therefore, Watson’s perspective might be a more flexible one. Despite they both see the problem of a contemporary theory focused in the global North because it might be not relevant for the growing urban world in the global south and will keep accentuating traditional patterns, Watson’s goals build on the relationships existing at a world scale by attending first the complex unattended issues in the global South urban context from within it.
With this article, Schindler also tries to sum up to the characterization of the southern city and moves forward on it bring a set of three tendencies on global South cities a starting for more city focused studies in the South context, considering the differences that exist between them. The three tendencies highlighted are the disconnection between capital and labor, the discontinuous and dynamic metabolic configurations, and the fact that political economy does not cover the totality of the urban processes.
Watson also advances in this view bringing as a way of going beyond the conventional planning theory through the idea of a “Clash of rationalities” happening mainly in the global South but not limited to it, a clash between the dynamics of the governing systems and the dynamics of the marginalized population tied to the informality logics (Watson 2009). She focuses as well in the relationships between both of them and the spaces and practices in which they both overlay and intertwine.
From another view, Schindler states the global South city is “a distinctive type of human settlement” (Schindler 2017), totally different from the global North city, which is the reason why theories generated in the global North will never work for the global South. In the author’s view, not even concepts such as Brenner and Schmid’s “planetary urbanization” are useful for the understanding of the global South, for it is still ignoring southern cities characteristics and it can be a risk concept as it states as a planetary one keeping a northern context focus and base. Besides, he is also critical on postcolonial urbanism considering it has not been able to really enunciate how Southern cities differ from the Northern ones.
References
Watson, V. (2009) Seeing from the South: Refocusing Urban Planning on the Globe’s Central Urban Issues. Urban Studies, 46(11), pp. 2259–2275.
Schindler, S. (2017) Towards a paradigm of Southern urbanism. City: analysis of urban trends, culture, theory, policy, action, 21 (1), pp. 47-64.
Southern urban
theories
In the current state of affairs, the high interest and recognized need of generation of urban theories from the so-called global South viewpoint is wide spread and address from various perspectives. Approaches to the creation of new theories from the global South are diverse in form and in objectives and goals. Therefore, it is relevant to look in the diverse ways of understanding the importance of Southern Urbanism theories and contrast their views on what southern theories must be for and for whom. Which contexts should they be based on and respond to and what kind of problems should they revolve around?
In this review the perspectives on southern urbanism theories exposed in Vanessa Watson’s Seeing from the South: Refocusing Urban Planning on the Globe’s Central Urban Issues and Seth Schindler’s Towards a paradigm of Southern urbanism will be contrasted and discuss. Both authors reflect on the inefficiency of urban theories traditionally based and generated in the global North and allege the need of the generation of urban theories from the global South but the reasons behind this need are different and even contradictory.
On the view of Watson, theories from the South are needed because solving and understanding core urban problems from a southern perspective might be useful for urban planning approaches at a world scale. Considering the global South as the world region concentrating a higher rate and scale of urban growth, and having accentuated urban problems due to issues such as climate change and the problematics around urban poor population and inequality, having answers from this context and expecting them to inform and reshape global urban theories and planning practices seems a suitable and positive approach.
This means she answers to the questions: How to look the urban planetary situation and problems from a southern perspective? How to think planetary from southern reflections?
In other words, she looks at the global South as the source for new contemporary theories and revisions of concepts for a worldwide application.
Schindler sticks to Scott view in which “theory should be situated within the ‘problem-space’ of the present and offer answers for the future” (Schindler 2017), and argues the reason behind the relevance and importance of urban theories from the global South is for it to respond to its own characteristics, urban questions and problems, which are not the same as the ones in the global North. In this occasion, the author tries to answer the questions: How to think about the global South from the global south itself and develop theories for its specific concerns and main problems? How to comprehend the global South context without portraying it as an environment in need for global North development intervention?
Even though both authors acknowledge urban south core issues, through the characterization of the countering rationalities and the tendencies, each of them has a different goal for urban theory from the South to emerge and thrive. Schindler, stating that cities from the global South are a totally different and distinctive type of settlements that need a theory from its context that would just focus on it, gives a high push to the understanding of complex dynamics that traditional theories have not covered or comprehend but risks a lot as well. By stating global South and North having totally different “problem-space” that should then be responded with totally different theories, an opportunity to sharing views and complementing theories around core urban problems that might be present worldwide, could be lost.
While a more flexible view will come from Watson statements, in which a global South focus also brings a lot into the comprehension of urban phenomena not widely studied by the traditional theories and, additionally, it is presented as a way to challenge the traditional global North theories views and assumptions that are not applicable to global South and perhaps no longer current or true nor for the global North as well. A global South perspective urban theory is then presented as an opportunity for evolve in planetary urban theories as a whole, it makes it relevant for everyone putting on it the seed for moving forward in urban planning approaches, moving forward in new ways of tackling central urban issues.
Therefore, Watson’s perspective might be a more flexible one. Despite they both see the problem of a contemporary theory focused in the global North because it might be not relevant for the growing urban world in the global south and will keep accentuating traditional patterns, Watson’s goals build on the relationships existing at a world scale by attending first the complex unattended issues in the global South urban context from within it.
With this article, Schindler also tries to sum up to the characterization of the southern city and moves forward on it bring a set of three tendencies on global South cities a starting for more city focused studies in the South context, considering the differences that exist between them. The three tendencies highlighted are the disconnection between capital and labor, the discontinuous and dynamic metabolic configurations, and the fact that political economy does not cover the totality of the urban processes.
Watson also advances in this view bringing as a way of going beyond the conventional planning theory through the idea of a “Clash of rationalities” happening mainly in the global South but not limited to it, a clash between the dynamics of the governing systems and the dynamics of the marginalized population tied to the informality logics (Watson 2009). She focuses as well in the relationships between both of them and the spaces and practices in which they both overlay and intertwine.
From another view, Schindler states the global South city is “a distinctive type of human settlement” (Schindler 2017), totally different from the global North city, which is the reason why theories generated in the global North will never work for the global South. In the author’s view, not even concepts such as Brenner and Schmid’s “planetary urbanization” are useful for the understanding of the global South, for it is still ignoring southern cities characteristics and it can be a risk concept as it states as a planetary one keeping a northern context focus and base. Besides, he is also critical on postcolonial urbanism considering it has not been able to really enunciate how Southern cities differ from the Northern ones.
References
Watson, V. (2009) Seeing from the South: Refocusing Urban Planning on the Globe’s Central Urban Issues. Urban Studies, 46(11), pp. 2259–2275.
Schindler, S. (2017) Towards a paradigm of Southern urbanism. City: analysis of urban trends, culture, theory, policy, action, 21 (1), pp. 47-64.
