Franklin Obeng-Odoom teaches urban economics at the School of Built Environment, University of Technology Sydney (UTS) in Australia. He is an International Social Science Council world social science fellow in sustainable urbanisation. Franklin was elected to the Fellowship of the Ghana Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2015, becoming the country's youngest fellow. In 2016, he won the Patrick Welch prize awarded by the Association for Social Economics and his book Reconstructing Urban Economics was listed in the top 5 entries for the Egon Matzner Prize 2017.

The book reminds us that issues of the urban question around spatial inequality in terms of housing, transport, jobs or other metrics, are issues that have historical precedents, are trans-national and trans-cultural … So when politicians, think-tanks, industry peak bodies, or universities offer simple solutions that promote the status quo, books like this one help us to articulate our rebuttals.

• PrefaceIntroduction: Dissent and ReconstructionPart I: Establishing Principles for Urban Progress1. Scaffolding the Principles and Values of Reconstruction2. The Urban Challenge3. The Urban EconomyPart II: Analysing Material Conditions in Cities4. Urban Economic Growth: Globalisation, Trade, and Convergence5. Informal Economies6. Urban Poverty; Socio-Spatial InequalityPart III: Creating a Socio-Ecologically Sensitive Future7. Housing8. Homo Automobilus9. Sustainable Urban DevelopmentConclusion: Towards A Political Economy of the Built Environment