CityReads│Contradictions: The Glory and the Darkness of Cities

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Contradictions: The Glory and theDarkness of Cities

Four groupsof inherent contradictions of cities: wealth/poverty, destruction/sustainability, oligarchy/democracy and intolerance/tolerance.

Robert A. Beauregard. 2018. Cities in theUrban Age: A Dissent. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Robin, Enora. “Robert A. Beauregard 2018: Cities in the Urban Age: A Dissent. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.”International Journal of Urban and Regional Research 42, no. 5 (2018): 952–53.https://doi.org/10.1111/1468-2427.12685.

Source: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/1468-2427.12685

According to the urbanization level released by United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, 55% of the world’s people have lived in cities by 2018, and that number will increase in the future. Urban life is becoming the main way of people’s life. However, a commonplace but still being debated question is how we think about cities.

The mass media, policy makers and urban elites loudly praise the progressiveness of cities, which like the cities fuel the development of economy, talents; capital and technology all converge here that breed innovation and unlimited opportunities. All in all, cities are the solution to all problems. Robert A. Beauregard, professor of urban planning at Columbia GSAPP, has clearly expressed his dissent voice in the new book Cities in theUrban Age: A Dissent. What is the other side of the city like behind the glorious mask of progressivism? Beauregard doesn't think it’s wholly advantageous. As recently as the early twentieth century, its residents were overwhelmed by epidemics, were made ill by contaminated water, lacked basic health care, and had limited access to education. Today, new urban ills are emerging, such as poverty, slums, racial discrimination, anti-immigrant sentiment, and terrorism. Uncritically advocating the advancement of the city, ignoring its dark side finally deepen the contradictions, instead of helping solve the problem.

The author identifies the contradictions in the nature of cities, which can be classified into the following four groups: wealth/poverty, destruction/sustainability, oligarchy/democracy and intolerance/tolerance. The four groups organized as four chapters respectivelyform the main content of the book.

First group: wealth/poverty. Cities create great wealth, but they are concentrated inthe hands of a few individuals, families and corporations. And the other side of the coin, extreme poverty and inequality result. Compared with rural villages, the stark  disparities in income and wealth are most evident in the urban age.

Second: destruction/sustainability. The large size of urban population, high density and complexity put great strains on natural resources and animal habitats. However, the destruction also makes people realize the importance of sustainable development. In recent years, various attempts and efforts made by countries around the world for the sustainability show that this may offer unprecedented opportunity. Pittsburgh in the mid-20th century and Phoenix contemporary are the best examples.

Third: oligarchy/democracy. This chapter explores the political regimes, especially interms of race, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, and immigrant status. Political influence and public resources are more blessed the few with private wealth and political connections. Local governments tend to be have more oligarchicallythan democratically. When the balance tilt heavily, the grassroots may rise up and assert democracy, transparency, solving social problems, etc., which can also promote the prosperity of democracy to some extent.

Forth: intolerance/tolerance. In fact, American cities are not as open and treating the differences easily as the prevailing view, even it doesn’t be more open than countryside. Black minorities and segregation have long existed. In the competition for neighborhoods, jobs, and housing, however, differences often breed antagonism, contempt, and violence. crimes, ethnic and religious groups face discrimination, and people of color are segregated in housing and labor markets. Although tolerance exists, it does so precariously.

Cities don't create contradictions, however it mediates between them, sometimes nurturing often amplifying, and, at times, even dampening their opposing forces. Contradictions and contest always are ever-present, neither temporary nor avoidable through human power. Changing populations, technologies, lifestyles, and institutions mean that cities need to relentlessly adapt to the new situation. Cities have no boundary or a fixed set of functions. They are always in flux. Thus cities can never reach equilibrium or be complete. Instead of static purposeful thinking, we should recognize the unsettle normality of cities. This unsettle fundament doesnot necessarily represent chaos.

The author's intention is to remind most rabid advocates to look critically at the progress and development currently. He tends to use political economy advocated by Marxist scholars to explain the nature of urban contradictions, whose dialectical thinking emphasizes the tension in talking social issues.

This book selects the American cities familiar to the author as the analysis objects. From small cities, medium-sized and large cities, from urban history to contemporary status, the cases are extremely wide range and all-embracing. What should be noted is that the issues discussed in this book are also can be seen in other country or region.

Different from academic monographs, this book is aimed specifically at the general public, neither urban scholars nor exploited marginalized groups. Its goal is to encourage the public think about cities critically, hoping can see the dark side of the city dialectically, rethink their relationship with others, and reconfigures the citizens’ responsibilities and urban political arrangement when they propagate the city without thinking. It is through the recognition and appreciation of the types of exclusion, inequalities, injustice and environmental degradation that urbanization engenders, but also of the potential for tolerance, environmentally sustainable, democratic and more just futures cities can offer, that we might start thinking about ‘the conditions under which we join the civic realmas political beings’.

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