Reflections on 10/17 readings

A common thread in the readings is the homogenization of cities by upper middle class people and real estate developers. The article on Mexico City focuses on the concept of the “right to the city”, the idea that all of the inhabitants of a given city have collective control and power within the place they live.

This article examined the articulation of the right to the city by Mexico City’s poorest residents, and how they gained agency over their spaces by collectively engaging with the city government and exercising political rights. The writer of the article described how this collective agency is eroding as a result of the absence of funding and increasing power of capital, while the citizens’ political activism had devolved into a collection of individually competing groups that lacked any sense of unified focus.

While the other articles focus on different topics within each particular context, each one can be connected to the idea of the right to the city. In Tokyo, small business leaders are being pressured to leave by corporate developers. In Johannesburg, a flood of investment and rich young people is revitalizing the city center as a wealthy enclave, while the city’s poor remain in slum conditions. In Paris, aspects of local culture including brothels are being erased and replaced by homogenized hipster culture. In each case study, one group’s right to the city is being revoked in favor of another, more profitable group.

The article about Paris discusses how cocktail bars and fancy clothing stores have been opening up in an area that used to be all hookers and independent businesses. In a city that has been known for its distinctive cibe and cosmopolitan culture for probably centuries, it’s weird to picture American bars and coffee shops mirroring a generic block in Williamsburg. It absolutely does not fit and contradicts the urban landscape that has existed in Paris for generations. I don’t understand why it would be appealing to get rid of the brasseries and boulangeries (or brothels) of Paris, for residents, tourists, or even developers. Why do Parisians need a separate location to drink their cocktails, and only cocktails, outside of restaurants? Since when are bars a thing in Paris?

In each of the case studies examined in the articles, the main question is whether citizens will be able to claim and defend their right to the city, or if the right to profit will trump everything else.