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Castells on Alternative Economic Cultures

ANALYSIS: Alternative Economic Cultures RADIO 4  Monday 8.30pm

Paul Mason interviews renowned sociologist Prof Manuel Castells about the
rise of alternative economic cultures since the financial crisis. Recorded in
front of an audience at the London School of Economics on Monday 8th
October.

The financial crisis which has unfolded since 2008 marks more than an
economic downturn, according to Prof Castells. The problems which caused the
crisis are so deep rooted that they have provoked a profound reassessment of our
economic beliefs and institutions. They have also given rise to social movements
such as Occupy and alternative economic cultures opposed to financial
capitalism. These ideas are explored in "Aftermath: The Cultures of the Economic
Crisis", a book edited by Prof Castells.

What does it take to become a dementia-friendly city?

York Dementia Without Walls: putting people with dementia at its heart

Dementia-friendly communities can better support people in the early stages of their illness, maintaining confidence and boosting their ability to manage everyday life.

York Dementia Without Walls is an ‘action research’ project – which means that its approach is to talk

to, listen to and observe people with dementia and their carers in a variety of settings and situations.

An underlying premise of its work is that people with dementia have a contribution to make to society.

Rather than constantly being seen as dependent, there might be an ‘interdependency’ to discover

where people with dementia are naturally included and valued as essential to strong and diverse

communities.

Synod to debate riots report

Testing the bridges : understanding the role of the church amidst riots, disturbances and disorder

On Sunday 8th July the Church of England's General Synod will consider a report on how the churches reposnded to the disorder in English cities during August 2012. The report is based on interviews  with clergy and others in the affected areas and draws conclsuions about the Church's reslience and vital presence in areas of unease and unrest.

Our churches and clergy are often the remaining anchor points in communities where

other anchors have disappeared – often seen as marginal, but vital when a crisis comes

upon a neighbourhood. It is a long term commitment.  

“We need a confident assertion – the church is here doing what it should –

recognisable, resilient.”

Interview with David Harvey

Matt Mahon's interview with David Harvey for White Review  is available online. Harvey outlines his latest book Rebel Cities and muses on the interplay between marxist and anarchist geographers.

 A struggle against accumulation by dispossession should be as central to what a political movement is about as a struggle against appropriation of labour in production. That should be part and parcel of a much broader political struggle. The place where all that has to come together, where it does come together as a unity, is in city life. In the city we experience all those forms of exploitation and oppression, almost on a daily basis.

Sold off cities

Public spaces in Britain's cities fall into private hands

Over the past decade, large parts of Britain's cities have been redeveloped as privately-owned estates, extending corporate control over some of the country's busiest squares and thoroughfares. These developments are no longer simply enclosed malls like Westfield in White City or business districts like Broadgate in the City of London – they are spaces open to the sky which appear to be entirely public to casual passers-by.It appears from the scale of the change that privatisation of space is now the standard price of redevelopment.

Guardian to create a map of privatised public spaces in Britain to see how much land is under corporate control

Rebel Cities: The Urbanization of Class Struggle

David Harvey at LSE Thursday 10th May

Harvey explores the contemporary reality of cities as the arenas for revolutionary politics. To what extent can current movements be described as 'calss struggle'? How do these movements draw on 'right to the city' discourse in thier attempts to tranform societies as well as the streets?

See also

Hatherley on Harvey

 'For Harvey, the left must be modern and urban or it will remain powerless.'

Patrick Keiller commission opens at Tate Briatin

The Robinson Institute

Renowned artist and film-maker Patrick Keiller, has created an ambitious new project for the Tate Britain Commission 2012.

Patrick Keiller is one of Britain’s most critically acclaimed independent film-makers. Over the past 30 years he has developed a range of imaginative and highly original films which combine deadpan images of British landscape, rural and urban, with a witty narration which draws together wide-ranging literary anecdotes, historical episodes, current affairs, economic critique and offbeat humour.

The most notable examples of Keiller’s distinctive approach to film-making are the series of essay films that chart the progress of the fictional character Robinson, an elusive would-be scholar who wanders the English landscape, taking the viewer on unpredictable journeys.

Guardian review

Hatherley on Keiller:  How Patrick Keiller is mapping the 21st-century landscape

Riots report published

After the riots

The Riots Communities and Victims Panel’s final report was published on 28 March 2012. This sets out the final findings and recommendations for action to help prevent future riots.

The wide ranging issues and recommendations tackled in the Panel-s final report include:

• Families aren’t getting the support they need. The Panel supports the Government’s Troubled Families Programme, but found that the overlap with rioters is limited. Government and local public services should develop a strategy incorporating the principles of the Troubled Families Programme to help 500,000 ‘forgotten families’ turn their lives around.
• Communities told the Panel that young people need to build character to help them realise their potential and to prevent them making poor decisions, like rioting. Schools should assume responsibility for helping children build character.
• Children are leaving school unable to read and write – one fifth of school leavers have the literacy skills of an eleven year old, or younger. Where schools fail to teach children to read and write they should pay a financial penalty, used to help the pupil ‘catch up’.
• Communities and young people told the Panel that having a job is key to people feeling that they have a stake in society. Government and local public services should fund together a ‘Youth Job Promise’ scheme to get young people a job, when they have been unemployed for a year.

Lockdown London: Bread, Circuses and CCTV

Welcome to Fortress London

Stephen Graham describes howLondon 2012 will see the UK's biggest mobilisation of military and security forces since the second world war and the effects will linger long after the athletes have left.

'..large swaths of London and the UK are being thrown into ever deeper insecurity while being asked to pay for a massive security operation, of unprecedented scale, largely to protect wealthy and powerful people and corporations.'

'...the homeland and Olympic security boom is being fuelled by the widening adoption of the idea of "asymmetric" war as the key security idea among nation states, militaries and corporations. Here, rather than war with other states, the main challenge for states is deemed to be mobilising more or less permanently against vague non-state or civilian threats that lurk within their own cities and the infrastructures that connect them.'

'Looking at these various points together shows one thing: contemporary Olympics are society on steroids. They exaggerate wider trends. Far removed from their notional or founding ideals, these events dramatically embody changes in the wider world: fast-increasing inequality, growing corporate power, the rise of the homeland security complex, and the shift toward much more authoritarian styles of governance utterly obsessed by the global gaze and prestige of media spectacles.'

Architecture at its toughest

From New Statesman

Concrete poetry

Thirty years after the opening of the Barbican Centre in the city of London, Amanda Levete celebrates a much maligned brutalist masterpiece that has become fashionable once more.

'This is architecture at its toughest and it commands respect. The serrated tower profiles are beautifully articulated, the jagged water stains on the curved concrete balconies only enhancing the form. Podium flats look on to a lush landscape and water, some on piloti striding across the lake.'

'The Barbican is a microcosm of the changing political and aesthetic mores of the past 60 years. The flats were designed during the heady years of the postwar social-democratic experiment and a significant number of them were designated for subsidised housing. The corporation would be the landlord and residents would be tenants.'

'Today, the City is synonymous with discredited financial institutions. Perhaps it is time for their denizens to act with a sense of civic responsibility and to imagine a new model for financing and managing social housing. They could start by learning from the Barbican.'