Corso di Laurea Magistrale Interateneo in Geografia e Scienze Territoriali (LM-80)

this course is intende to provide students with key theoretical and analytical tools enabling them to understand today's urban question, against the backdrop of an increasingly more polycentric and turbulent capitalist globalisation that has to deal with destabilizing forces at both economic (financialization, inter-state rivalries, social and spatial inequalities) and political (the populist explosion, social justice movements) levels. The course will put forward a critical approach to the study of contemporary global urbanism: students will become familiar with urban political economy and with the application of critical theory to the interpretation of social, economic and political issues in their urban manifestation. 

It is expected that students will develop an independent thinking on issues variously related to today's global capitalist urbanisation, in their multiple and intersected economic, political and societal implications. At the end of this course, students will be able to analyse academic literature on the topic, as well as high-quality newspaper articles and official documentation by national and local governments, as well as by international organisations.

this course will be essentially based on conventional formal lectures. However, an active participation by the students - individually as well as through group work - will be encouraged, particularly through presentations and critical readings. This course will make wide use of news media outlets as well as of a variety of cultural sources, such as films and music, in order to make sense of the variegated nature of today's global urbanisation.  

The final exam will consist of an oral examination based on some open questions that will touch on key aspects of this course, both in general and more specific terms. Due to the COVID19 emergency, the examination in the summer session will be carried out online through the Webex platform. 

there are no specific suppport activites being organised for this course, apart from a constant tutoring offered to students on both methodological and conceptual levels. 

This course is divided into two main parts. After a short introduction to critical urban theory, the first part will offer a tour de force around the major issues related to the contemporary urban question from a critical geographical viewpoint, such as the politics of urban representation, the mobilisation of culture and creativity for urban regeneration purposes, the neoliberalisation of urban economic development, urban geopolitics, the struggles over urban citizenship, social and environmental justice movements. The second part will zoom in on today's increasingly more inextricable relationship between cities and global capitalism and how this relationship has evolved before and after the major economic crisis of the late 2000s. In this part, attention will be dedicated to the emerging phenomena of platform urbanism, the sharing economy, as well as the renewed prominence of the urban commons in political terms and the widespread development of housing struggles in response to the global housing crisis afflicting cities and metro areas across the world.