Jonathan Silver - Böcker

Providing a global overview of experiments around the transformation of cities' electricity networks and the social struggles associated with this change, this book explores the centrality of electricity infrastructures in the urban configuration of social control, segregation, integration, resource access and poverty alleviation. Through multiple accounts from a range of global cities, this edited collection establishes an agenda that recognises the uneven, and often historical, geographies of urban electricity networks, prompting attempts to re-wire the infrastructure configurations of cities and predicating protest and resistance from residents and social movements alike. Through a robust theoretical engagement with established work around the politics of urban infrastructures, the book frames the transformation of electricity systems in the context of power and resistance across urban life, drawing links between environmental and social forms of sustainability. Such an agenda can provide both insight and inspiration in seeking to build fairer and more sustainable urban futures that bring electricity infrastructures to the fore of academic and policy attention.

Providing a global overview of experiments around the transformation of cities' electricity networks and the social struggles associated with this change, this book explores the centrality of electricity infrastructures in the urban configuration of social control, segregation, integration, resource access and poverty alleviation. Through multiple accounts from a range of global cities, this edited collection establishes an agenda that recognises the uneven, and often historical, geographies of urban electricity networks, prompting attempts to re-wire the infrastructure configurations of cities and predicating protest and resistance from residents and social movements alike. Through a robust theoretical engagement with established work around the politics of urban infrastructures, the book frames the transformation of electricity systems in the context of power and resistance across urban life, drawing links between environmental and social forms of sustainability. Such an agenda can provide both insight and inspiration in seeking to build fairer and more sustainable urban futures that bring electricity infrastructures to the fore of academic and policy attention.

EPDF and EPUB available Open Access under CC-BY-NC-ND licence.Focusing on material and social forms of infrastructure, this edited collection draws on rich empirical details from cities across the global North and South. The book asks the reader to think through the different ways in which infrastructure comes to be present in cities and its co-constitutive relationships with urban inhabitants and wider processes of urbanization. Considering the climate emergency, economic transformation, public health crises and racialized inequality, the book argues that paying attention to infrastructures’ past, present and future allows us to understand and respond to the current urban condition.

China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), commonly called the New Silk Road, is a huge infrastructure project currently revitalising or creating new trading routes and large developments across the globe. It is estimated to cost up to US$8 trillion and impact more than 65% of the world’s population. This book explores the unequal ways this controversial project is altering livelihoods, places and the environment. From road building projects in Nairobi to grassroots environmental activism in Thailand, researchers from the Global North and South analyse the real-world impacts of this unprecedented project, bringing together critical geography and political ecology approaches.

EPUB and EPDF available open access under CC-BY-NC-ND licence.China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), commonly called the New Silk Road, is a huge infrastructure project currently revitalising or creating new trading routes and large developments across the globe. It is estimated to cost up to US$8 trillion and impact more than 65% of the world’s population. This book explores the unequal ways this controversial project is altering livelihoods, places and the environment. From road building projects in Nairobi to grassroots environmental activism in Thailand, researchers from the Global North and South analyse the real-world impacts of this unprecedented project, bringing together critical geography and political ecology approaches.

How do we find new ways of urban being and doing? This edited collection explores how global capitalism has shaped cities into sites of inequality, precarity and alienation—spaces designed to serve profit rather than people. Drawing on diverse examples, the book analyses how urban life is failing under current economic systems and offers real-world alternatives that promote human flourishing. From rethinking urban governance to exploring community-led initiatives, the collection offers evidence-based visions for cities grounded in care, equity and social purpose. It is a vital resource for anyone seeking to understand and transform urban life in the face of deepening global crises.