Dissertation•
Business Improvement Areas and the Justification of Urban Revitalization: Using the Pragmatic Sociology of Critique to Understand Neoliberal Urban Governance
01 Sep 2019-
About: The article was published on 2019-09-01 and is currently open access. It has received None citations till now. The article focuses on the topics: Urban sociology & Social order.
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Journal Article•
145 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors present the moral and political sociology developed by the research group around Luc Boltanski and Laurent Thevenot from its gradual dissociation from the tradition of critical sociology during the 1980s to the present.
Abstract: This article presents the moral and political sociology developed by the research group around Luc Boltanski and Laurent Thevenot from its gradual dissociation from the tradition of critical sociology during the 1980s to the present. Taking the major presentation of this approach, De la justification, as the point of departure, the key items of criticism to which this book was exposed are discussed, both in terms of their intellectual merit and in light of the ongoing debates in French social and political theory. The work of this group was often rather erroneously taken to have provided both a new theory of society and a new normative political philosophy. What it aimed at achieving in the first place, in contrast, was a questioning of the assumptions on which reasonings in social theory and political philosophy are based and how those reasonings relate to social actors' own engagement with the world. Not least in response to the criticism received, however, the approach has been further elaborated in re...
145 citations
TL;DR: The authors discusses how recent discourses of the role of creativity in regions have drawn upon, and contributed to, particular forms of neoliberalisation, and concludes by suggesting that neoliberal discourses ignore the varied ways in which alternative creativities might underpin other articulations of the future of Australia's regions.
Abstract: Regional economic policy-makers are increasingly interested in the contribution of creativity to the economic performance of regions and, more generally, in its power to transform the images and identities of places. This has constituted a ‘cultural turn’, of sorts, away from an emphasis on macro-scale projects and employment schemes, towards an interest in the creative industries, entrepreneurial culture and innovation. This paper discusses how recent discourses of the role of ‘creativity’ in regions have drawn upon, and contributed to, particular forms of neoliberalisation. Its focus is the recent application of a statistical measure — Richard Florida's (2002) ‘creativity index’— to quantify spatial variations in creativity between Australia's regions. Our critique is not of the creativity index per se, but of its role in subsuming creativity within a neoliberal regional economic development discourse. In this discourse, creativity is linked to the primacy of global markets, and is a factor in place competition, attracting footloose capital and ‘creative class’ migrants to struggling regions. Creativity is positioned as a central determinant of regional ‘success’ and forms a remedy for those places, and subjects, that currently ‘lack’ innovation. Our paper critiques these interpretations, and concludes by suggesting that neoliberal discourses ignore the varied ways in which ‘alternative creativities’ might underpin other articulations of the future of Australia's regions.
142 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors examine the socio-spatial relationship facilitating the neoliberal post-apartheid regime and its governance in the city of Cape Town, South Africa and reveal its difficulties in stabilizing the sociospatial relations of a transnationalizing urban revitalization strategy and rejects the view of CIDS as simply a global roll-out of neoliberal urban policies.
Abstract: To achieve a world-class city capable of attracting business in a competitive global market, the municipal government of Cape Town, South Africa, like many cities of the global North, has adopted a model of urban revitalization popularized by New York City: Business or City Improvement Districts (BIDs or CIDs). By examining CIDs in center city Cape Town, the paper casts light on the socio-spatial relationship facilitating the neoliberal post-apartheid regime and its governance. Analyzing discursive and spatial practices of Cape Town Partnership, the managing body of downtown CIDs, from 2000 to 2006, the paper reveals its difficulties in stabilizing the socio-spatial relations of a transnationalizing urban revitalization strategy and rejects the view of CIDS as simply a global roll-out of neoliberal urban policies. It highlights how CIDs are challenged from both within and without their managing structures by contentious local issues, and in particular by vast social inequalities and citizens’ historical struggle for inclusive citizenship and the right to the city. Whether and how CIDs’ inherent limitations can be overcome to address socio-spatial inequalities is an open question.
142 citations
TL;DR: In this article, Cook and MacDonald showed that the social benefits of business improvement districts (BID) expenditures on security are a large multiple (about 20) of the private expenditures.
Abstract: Private actions to avoid and prevent criminal victimisation and assist public law enforcement are vital inputs into the crime-control process. One form of private action, the business improvement district (BID), appears particularly promising. A BID is a non-profit organisation created by property owners to provide local public goods, usually including public safety. Our analysis of 30 Los Angeles BIDs demonstrates that the social benefits of BID expenditures on security are a large multiple (about 20) of the private expenditures. Crime displacement appears minimal. Crime reduction in the BID areas has been accompanied by a reduction in arrests, suggesting further savings. Given the vital role of private individuals and firms in determining the effectiveness of the criminal justice system, and the quality and availability of criminal opportunities, private actions arguably deserve a more central role in the analysis of crime and crime prevention policy. 1 But the leading scholarly commentaries on the crime drop during the 1990s have largely ignored the role of the private sector (Blumstein and Wallman, 2000; Levitt, 2004; Zimring, 2007). The potentially relevant trends include: growing reporting rates; the growing sophistication and use of alarms; monitoring equipment and locks; the considerable increase in the employment of private security guards; and the decline in the use of cash (Cook and MacDonald, 2010). Private actions can be encouraged or discouraged through regulation of the insurance industry, reducing the costs of private co-operation with police and courts, gun control measures, and other means. The justification for such measures is the reasonable presumption that many sorts of private action to avoid, mitigate and respond to crime generate substantial externalities. Business improvement districts (BIDs) are a particularly promising institution for harnessing private action to cost-effective crime control. A BID is a non-profit organisation created by neighbourhood property owners to provide local public goods, including public safety. The organisation has the power to tax all the owners in the district, including those who did not sign the original petition. Previous evaluations of BIDs in Los Angeles (LA) indicate that they are successful in reducing crime rates (Brooks, 2008; MacDonald et al., 2009). We provide a further analysis of the costs and benefits, including the effect on arrests and spillovers, and we estimate a dose‐response
140 citations