Urbanscapes of Injustice and Insecurity (original) (raw)

""In the last few years security has become a major policy concern. The demand for predictability, certainty and control seems endless. Ideals of Liberté, Égalité Fraternité seem to have been replaced by Securité, Securité, Securité. Rights and values that were once taken for granted are now traded-off, in the hope that this will contribute to building safer environments in the era of ‘global terror’ and ‘a world of terror and missiles and madmen.’ Much has been written about this process at the global, geopolitical, post-9/11 level (Graham 2010, Klein 2007, Lyon 2003, Martin & Petro 2006), but the impact of these developments at the local level, as well as the local role in the shaping of these processes is still under-researched. While most of the things that are written about cities in the 21st century mention or expose some of the trends that inform the major shift outlined above, many fail to connect the dots and provide a comprehensive picture of how the local sphere is redefining and asserting its role in a globalised world. A close look at recent local policies in the light of such global processes reveals a counter-intuitive picture. A picture where the rhetoric about the potential of the urban sphere to foster participation, creativity, social capital and accountability meets a practice of revanchism, exclusion and punitivism (Smith 1996, Bannister and Kearns 2009, Garland 2001). The picture is of a society that preaches respect, but where respect is always a demand for the self, not a practice towards others (Sennett 2003). Cities where deviancy is ‘defined up’ and new local by-laws and police powers increase the sphere of the ‘not allowed’, the dangerous and the anti-social – all in the name of security. Could our cities be at the forefront of the ‘exclusionary urge’? Could it be that for all the academic talk about the potential of the local government, in terms of representation, responsibility, accountability, etc. ( Jones and Stewart 1983, Wolman 1990), the possibility of new landscapes of justice and security is being eroded in our streets and squares?""