Today we discussed readings by two authors with similar (urban justice) goals- but rather different methods of analysis and conclusions.  Susan Fainstein, a Planning professor at Harvard University, offers three principles that she thinks should be used to reshape our approach to urban planning- Democracy, Diversity, and Equity (see the rest of her book for case studies in which she used these principles to evaluate specific planning projects).  David Harvey, a Professor of Marxist theory and practice at the CUNY Graduate Center, argues that we must address the central contradictions of capitalism (that we’ve been discussing throughout the semester), which he traces through urbanization/urban growth/uneven development processes.  As many of you pointed out in your reading responses, he concludes that we (the people) must take control over these processes, or in other words, demand and enact a (collective) “right to the city.”  These readings highlight the lack of consensus that exists, even on the left, around what can/should be done to address issues of injustice and inequality.  They also leave a lot of questions unanswered, like what a just city/urban revolution would look like about and how exactly we might get there from here.  Please use these readings in your group projects to help you and your community contact  imagine, explore, and specify the range of possible responses.

This weeks readings again suggest the contradictory nature of urban planning and community involvement. Both articles, as well as the Stein article question who the city is for, and who has the power to shape it.

Harvey defines the right to the city as “to claim some kind of shaping power over the process of urbanization”, which we started talking about as a response to development of the city in terms of displacement and growth. Urbanization, however, as Harvey points out, is a result of capital growth and surplus- urbanization is supposed to prompt more growth. The reference to large scale urban planning brings about modern issues of uneven growth, as Robert Moses rethought structuring cities, and reshaped New York on a more holistic level, or on a broader scale. This seems like the “placeless” planning referenced in last weeks article on community response to private development.

The Smith article in this week’s announcement section puts these ideas directly in context, and discusses a mayor who is currently attempting to reshape the city. Mayor De Blasio is not as progressive as he claims to be, especially in terms of urban planning. What he is selling himself as, a liberal political leader fighting for equality in housing, is far from the truth. Smith cites a coalition established in Chinatown who proposed rezoning recommendations, yet were rejected because it preserved too much affordable housing. Private developments must incorporate inclusionary housing, but it is clear where urban planning priorities lie- development and restructuring the city must also contribute to growth. “Quality of urban life has become a commodity for those with money”, as Smith puts it. And why shouldn’t it, given the goals of urbanization. Under capitalism, it makes no sense for city planners to contribute toward the needs and consider the input of actual communities.

The solution to this is unclear. If the right to a city is establishing democratic control over the deployment of surplus, how can this be accomplished if land holds do much value in New York? A return of control back to communities seems implausible in a neoliberal society. Engel’s ideas date back to 1872, but resonate through so called progressives, from Bloomberg to De Blasio. Is full-scale urban revolution even possible? Is there any way to return control of capital surplus to those it would affect, or is this counterintuitive?

All of the articles read so far on planning have made one thing increasingly clear; urban planning is no easy feat. This week’s reading, “Justice and Urban Transformation: Planning in Context” by Fainstein continues to highlight the shortcomings of ongoing urban planning policies. The main focus is that these policies take a biased approach that mainly succumbs to the interests of the upper and middle class and obliterates those of the lower class. Considering that a majority of the public is made up of lower class families, this essentially causes the effects of urban planning to go beyond just aesthetics and architecture. As Fainstein has mentioned, theorists have transformed city planning into a social science, which it has always been but has never been acknowledged as such before. The very building blocks of how the city is structured geographically, economically, and politically all allude to social relations within the communities formed in the city. For instance, last week’s article talked about how bias against Blacks have affected their social development; due to discrimination, a majority of Blacks frequent low incomes, choose neighborhoods that are affordable, and in this way choose neighborhoods that are mostly Black. This has led to a segregation that was for the large part unintentional, but still completely preventable. City planning policies have gradually created a pattern of living that has affected whole communities on a psychological level, violating the potential for a just city.

In our meeting with Ray Reyes today at Melrose Commons, he mentioned the psychological impact that planning has had on the community in terms of community gardens. In his words, “A flower garden would be growing flowers, a vegetable garden would be growing vegetables, a community garden grows all of these plants, but it also grows a community.” These words stuck out to me, because it demonstrates the complexity that is a community; something that existing laws and policies cannot deal with as well as something that is sensitive enough to become molded  through these same laws and policies. In his piece “The Right to the City”, Harvey also discusses the urban renewal of Paris, and how the vibrant neighborhood he once knew was now crumbling, disintegrating, and becoming something unfamiliar.

DQ: How can city planning as a social science be integrated more into education and the large policy-making commissions of the city? How can pertaining to the social aspects of planning be beneficial for larger and more powerful groups such as real estate?

“The Right to the City” brought up a current view when looking at community and neighborhood planning. In recent years we have begun to think more about the “ideals of human rights” rather than just building to be efficient. This idea is reinforced in the “Planning in Context” reading as well, which talks about the various ways city planners need to take the people into consideration. They distinctly say that all “city users” could be taken into account, including residents, commuters, and visitors.”

These ideas are also discussed in the other readings we have touched upon, especially ones that examine Jacob’s views on city planning. Modernists leaned towards urban renewal through plans such as “superblocks”, but these lead to segregation and alienation. The people who end up residing in these communities often feel separated from the rest of the neighborhood and are looked upon differently, sometimes negatively based on their culture/race. But Jacob’s makes the point that diversity makes cities more appealing, and thus should be welcomed with open arms. In order to allow all different groups and communities to be incorporated as positive parts of New York City, we need to plan with all sorts of people in mind.

Another crucial part of this class’s reading was the dilemmas that surround public housing and assistance. Public policy dictates what city planners can and cannot do when it comes to projects and certain types of housing. That leads the city to allowing private owners to have “greater freedom to discriminate against problem tenants.” This idea is closely linked to my group’s project involving the homeless and shelter problems in New York City. The private ownership, without regulation, allows many people to be abused and neglected. City planning goes beyond new buildings and layouts, it also involves privately owned communities versus government run/ regulated properties.

“We live in a world where the rights of private property and profit rate trump all other notions of rights.”  

That above quote, by David Harvey, describes what the 21st century worldview is like. What happens in this kind of society is that our morality is no longer based upon human relations, but in material objects. All that was unquantifiable — water, land, housing, treatment of other humans — suddenly becomes commodified. What can be commodified can suddenly be exploited for our benefit. Our perspectives and beliefs of this world are based on these very notions until we become what Harvey describes as neoliberal individualists.

These kind of individuals see their life’s purpose as appropriating more wealth. We’re faced with the Faustian dilemma – “reinvest to get more money, or consume surplus”. There’s no room for thinking about the other person as someone with equal footing. You’re constantly thinking about how your interactions satisfy those two requirements – making or spending money. In a neoliberal society, capitalism and urbanization feed into each other. Which means that the in order for one to grow, there needs to be an expansion in the other. Capitalism is inherently imperialistic, and that’s a problem, eventually there’s going to be nothing left to conquer.

I thought Susan Fainstein’s article was a great complement to Harvey’s chapter. Harvey talks a lot about what it looks when the “intense possessive individualism can be a template for human personality socialization”. Basically, he’s saying that you can’t live in a society and not be personally effected. But while Harvey’s chapter leaves us own a downside, Fainstein proposes several actions that would appear to break this vicious cycle.

Fainstein begins with the political divorce of public policy determination from political influence. This divide between politics and administration was because of the noble belief that experts could develop policies in isolation from selfish interests. But, as they say, good intentions line the pathway to hell. This traditional belief is based on a classical, rational ideology – the assumption that humans will always make logical, patterned, and expected choices. Obviously, this is not the case. As Harvey as demonstrated, neoliberalism is what the traditional political attitude got us. Fainstein, however, is trying to reconnect what was formerly divided. In her planning theory, she’s especially keen on looking at the background, effects, and underlying principles. Her theory isn’t just about what’s rational – it’s about the irrational – human nature.

Taking into consideration what our current society is like, both Harvey and Fainstein agree that to claim a right to the city, you have to claim some kind of shaping power. Therefore, we need a way to redistribute power to the disenfranchised. Fainstein’s ladder of citizenship participation argues for a stronger role of the disadvantaged groups in formulating + implementing policy. “Without redistribution of decisional power, there is no redistribution of benefits.” This is what grassroots initiatives like Picture the Homeless are trying to do. By rallying together homeless people, and having these folks express their needs and suggest policies, the disadvantaged are creating a stronger voice.

Of course, a strong voice is one thing, but to what extent does the political system need to be re-evaluated? The disadvantaged might not be following the neoliberal ethic, but the politicians might. What are specific ways that the public can demand for reform without revolt?

Susan Fainstein argues that planning theory is flawed because it doesn’t take the urban space that it affects into context. Slapping rules and outlines onto a real, complex community doesn’t help the people that live in it. She introduces the ideas of Karl Mannheim, who aimed for an explicit theory in which experts could plan under guidance of the public through elected representatives. He wanted to make things more bureaucratic so that there would be no class-bias. Mannheim spoke of a new type of planning that was based on comprehensiveness. This sounded ideal, but did not take into account the differing priorities and views of people or organizations. Comprehensiveness is a system in which everyone’s values can be organized based on importance and planning can work based on those levels. I feel that such a clearly laid out system is impossible because the types of priorities that people have vary too much. Not only that, but there are some priorities like a sense of community that are hard to quantify and rank. This leads me to the approach that my group is taking with community gardens. Although gardens certainly provide food for the poor, lower crime rates, and increase property values, they also allow for a sense of community. There are some concepts that are too ambiguous and not quantifiable to simply be placed on a scale of importance.

Reminiscent of Jane Jacobs, Mannheim surmises that planning must be viewed more specifically, as the conditions in a certain area affect the people’s values. However, he is different from other communicative theorists because he still expects educated elites to lead this.

The next section talks about a call for democratic control that arose from the fact the people making policies didn’t understand the people that those policies were affecting. He introduces Sherry Anderson’s argument, which is that the results of planning will be more equal if the poor have more input in forming policies. This relates to DeRienzo’s idea of institutions allowing a community to have strength. Without the proper means or education, it is very difficult to make seemingly small matters heard. This concept also relates to David Harvey’s belief that we should aim for more democratic control over how surplus is created and used. Gradually, we see more privatization and power falling into the hands of the rich. Despite living in the city, the poor do not have a right to the city. Through this, we see the poor are at a disadvantage both in terms of institutions and government.

Discussion: How do we rank the importance of ambiguous concepts like a ‘sense of community’ in comparison to statistics like the amount of money a development project requires or makes?

Our exploration of the balance (or imbalance) of equality in the urbanization of cities continues as we explore the justice behind city planning. Fainstein and Harvey describe how, empirically, urbanization takes advantage of the lesser financial and political status of minorities and underrepresented groups.

Fainstein describes the transition of community planning from an aesthetic field to a social science, as the intellectuals of the mid-nineteenth century  decided to fix the disadvantages of poverty and discrimination in cities. He describes their proposed solutions, varying from neo-Marxist to democratic, with full citizen participation. However, none of the theories were ultimately put into action.

Harvey describes how Moses’ “suburbanization” of New York City led to the economic crisis of the sixties and seventies, causing the emptying of the city into suburbs and resulting in a polarization in the distribution of wealth (not unlike today’s) and unrest (and violence) in minority neighborhoods (“The Right to the City, 9).

Urbanization results in diversity, but did it result in equality throughout the classes?According to many, it did not, in fact leading to the formation of cultural enclaves throughout the city. Additionally, though it is fair to limit behaviors, we come to limit those who are stereotyped into those behaviors as well. Nevertheless, it is also a restriction on liberty to force people to live in the same building/neighborhood if they do not wish to do so. Unfortunately, progressive solutions seem to move around the key problems of segregation and inequality without solving the issues themselves.

However, it is important to note that not every social scientist agrees with the negative theories surrounding urbanization. Fainstein quotes Kirby in an explanation as to how urban sprawl can lead to benefits for those with lower incomes, as it leads to cheaper housing in fringe neighborhoods (84). Nevertheless, the immense costs and inequalities caused by urbanization far overshadow the benefit of cheaper real estate.

Harvey compares the urbanization and progression of our New York City with the development and urbanization in Paris in the mid nineteenth century, a social and economical era that ultimately ended in revolt. He shows how New York is following in the progression of Paris. Is there a way for New York City (or other cities worldwide facing the same change) to avoid the imminent revolt? Or is Robert Moses doomed to be known as a Hausmann?

The articles this week made some very interesting points in the discussion of how community planning goals interact with the reality of the city itself. I have consistently been asking in class where the ownership or power is truly in place concerning the neighborhoods of the city. The question is: who has the right to determine the city’s future, whether it be planners, city officials, or the residents?Throughout our previous discussions I have been trying to reconcile this disparity and have so far been unable to see a clear-cut answer. Fainstein finally addresses this inquiry in his paper, Justice and Urban Transformation: Planning in Context. Fainstein asserts that urban planners cannot just devise a model of what the ideal city would be and then tear down the existing city to build their vision. While this may be a crude generalization, Fainstein says that urban planning movements throughout history have all been carried out in this way. He mentions planners such as Ebenezer Howard, who modeled a ‘garden city’, as well as Daniel Burnham’s ‘City Beautiful’ concept. Fainstein states that these men’s, “implicit theoretical arguments dwelled on the nature of the good city instead of how one derived either of the ideals or the means to attain them.” So, while planners like Burnham and Howard may have had highly impressive theoretical ideas of how a city should run, they didn’t take into consideration the existing city that stood before them.

Harvey’s Rebel Cities reading put an economic perspective on the issue of how cities function under capitalism. He asserts that in urban development today, the human rights of residents are being ignored in order to fuel capitalism and growth. The city is seen as a profit making machine, not as a product of human expression and sustainability. Land use rights and profit margins are trumping the care for basic human rights of urban residents. People who live in a space are inherently invested in that space. Their voice on that space’s use is important regardless of what a land use piece of paper or zoning law says, which is not something which key players in the issue are taking enough into consideration before targeting areas for development. Using an eloquent quote from David Park, Harvey looks at the human aspect of urban planning and raises questions about what we have to consider before claiming to have found a ‘solution’ for a particular community. Cities can account for social relations, connection with nature, supportive communities, and countless opportunities for personal growth.

Discussion Q: Which rights should be given more consideration in planning decisions? Resident’s unwritten human rights or Public/Private property rights? What is given more consideration under our current system of urban planning?