Michael Peter Smith – författare

The world of modern capitalism is a global network both of corporations and of cities - 'world command cities' such as New York, London and Tokyo; 'specialized command cities' which concentrate on particular industries, such as Detroit; 'state command cities' such as Washington and Brasilia; and so on. These cities, linked by an organizational web of transnational corporations, are the pins holding the capitalist world economy together in the new international division of labour. In The Capitalist City a group of eminent scholars analyzes the intricate relationships among cities, state policies and urban politics at a time of economic restructuring at global, national and local levels to provide an original and timely contribution to one of the most important areas of political and social science.

Transnational Urbanism is a profound work of theoretical synthesis by internationally renowned urban theorist Michael Peter Smith.Moving deftly across disciplines and discursive terrains, Smith forges original and stimulating connections between urban studies and the emerging field of transnational studies. With original and extraordinary insight, he addresses the central question of how and why immigrants, refugees, political activists, and institutions locate and maintain social relations in light of transnational urbanism. Brings a concrete, historically informed discussion of globalization and transnationalism applied to urban studies.Offers a blueprint for reconstructing urban theory itself.Forges stimulating connections between the field of urban studies and the emerging field of transnational studies.

This compendium offers a textured historical and comparative examination of the significance of locality or "place," and the role of urban representations and spatial practices in defining national identities. Drawing upon a wide range of disciplines - from literature to architecture and planning, sociology, and history - these essays problematize the dynamic between the local and the national, the cultural and the material, revealing the complex interplay of social forces by which place is constituted and contributes to the social construction of national identity in Asia, Latin America, and the United States. These essays explore the dialogue between past and present, local and national identities in the making of "modern" places. Contributions range from an assessment of historical discourses on the relationship between modernity and heritage in turn-of-the-century Suzhou to the social construction of San Antonio's Market Square as a contested presencing of the city's Mexican past. Case studies of the socio-spatial restructuring of Penang and Jakarta show how place-making from above by modernizing states is articulated with a claims-making politics of class and ethnic difference from below. An examination of nineteenth-century Central America reveals a case of local grassroots formation not only of national identity but national institutions. Finally, a close examination of Latin American literature at the end of the nineteenth century reveals the importance of a fantastic reversal of Balzac's dystopian vision of Parisian cosmo-politanism in defining the place of Latin America and the possibilities of importing urban modernity.

Michael Peter Smith and Matt Bakker spent five years carrying out ethnographic field research in multiple communities in the Mexican states of Zacatecas and Guanajuato and various cities in California, particularly metropolitan Los Angeles. Combining the information they gathered there with political-economic and institutional analysis, the five extended case studies in Citizenship across Borders offer a new way of looking at the emergent dynamics of transnational community development and electoral politics on both sides of the border. Smith and Bakker highlight the continuing significance of territorial identifications and state policies—particularly those of the sending state—in cultivating and sustaining transnational connections and practices. In so doing, they contextualize and make sense of the complex interplay of identity and loyalty in the lives of transnational migrant activists. In contrast to high-profile warnings of the dangers to national cultures and political institutions brought about by long-distance nationalism and dual citizenship, Citizenship across Borders demonstrates that, far from undermining loyalty and diminishing engagement in U.S. political life, the practice of dual citizenship by Mexican migrants actually provides a sense of empowerment that fosters migrants' active civic engagement in American as well as Mexican politics.

Michael Peter Smith and Matt Bakker spent five years carrying out ethnographic field research in multiple communities in the Mexican states of Zacatecas and Guanajuato and various cities in California, particularly metropolitan Los Angeles. Combining the information they gathered there with political-economic and institutional analysis, the five extended case studies in Citizenship across Borders offer a new way of looking at the emergent dynamics of transnational community development and electoral politics on both sides of the border. Smith and Bakker highlight the continuing significance of territorial identifications and state policies—particularly those of the sending state—in cultivating and sustaining transnational connections and practices. In so doing, they contextualize and make sense of the complex interplay of identity and loyalty in the lives of transnational migrant activists. In contrast to high-profile warnings of the dangers to national cultures and political institutions brought about by long-distance nationalism and dual citizenship, Citizenship across Borders demonstrates that, far from undermining loyalty and diminishing engagement in U.S. political life, the practice of dual citizenship by Mexican migrants actually provides a sense of empowerment that fosters migrants' active civic engagement in American as well as Mexican politics.

For over three decades, urban theorist Michael Peter Smith has engaged in constructing innovative theories on central research questions in urban studies. This book brings together his views on the state of urban theory, sorting out the changing strengths and weaknesses in the field.  Smith refocuses attention on the cultural, social, and political practices of urban inhabitants, particularly the way in which their everyday activities have contributed to the social construction of new ethnic identities and new meanings of urban citizenship. Combining the methods of political economy and transnational ethnography, he encourages us to think about new political spaces for practicing "urban citizenship" by analyzing the connections linking cities to the web of relations to other localities in which they are embedded.  Smith systematically analyzes the dynamics of "community power" and "urban change" under new globalizing trends and increased transnational mobility. Expanding on his original conceptualization of "transnational urbanism," he frames urban political life within a wider transnational context of political practice, in which an endless interplay of distinctly situated networks, social practices, and power relations are fought out at multiple scales, in an inexorable politics of inclusion and exclusion.

This compendium offers a textured historical and comparative examination of the significance of locality or "place," and the role of urban representations and spatial practices in defining national identities. Drawing upon a wide range of disciplines - from literature to architecture and planning, sociology, and history - these essays problematize the dynamic between the local and the national, the cultural and the material, revealing the complex interplay of social forces by which place is constituted and contributes to the social construction of national identity in Asia, Latin America, and the United States. These essays explore the dialogue between past and present, local and national identities in the making of "modern" places. Contributions range from an assessment of historical discourses on the relationship between modernity and heritage in turn-of-the-century Suzhou to the social construction of San Antonio's Market Square as a contested presencing of the city's Mexican past. Case studies of the socio-spatial restructuring of Penang and Jakarta show how place-making from above by modernizing states is articulated with a claims-making politics of class and ethnic difference from below. An examination of nineteenth-century Central America reveals a case of local grassroots formation not only of national identity but national institutions. Finally, a close examination of Latin American literature at the end of the nineteenth century reveals the importance of a fantastic reversal of Balzac's dystopian vision of Parisian cosmo-politanism in defining the place of Latin America and the possibilities of importing urban modernity.

The literature on modernist and postmodernist urban development is abundant, yet few researchers have taken up the challenge of studying the areas hi which marginalized people live as sources of resistance to continued modernization. In Marginal Spaces, Michael Smith has assembled case studies combining structural and historical analyses of the moves of powerful social interests to dominate social space, and the tactics and strategies various marginalized social groups employ to reclaim dominated space for their own use. The marginal spaces embodied in the title of this fifth volume of the Comparative Urban and Community Research series include five sites of domination and resistance. A squatters' movement in Ann Arbor, Michigan, resists the adverse consequences of four decades of urban development. A homeless encampment in Chicago engages hi "guerilla architecture" and other moves designed to reconstitute prevailing social constructions of the problem of "homelessness." An antigentrification movement hi the East Village of New York engages hi an ongoing struggle to resist efforts by developers to market their neighborhood as space for luxury condominium development. There is a Public Housing Council organized by African American women hi New Orleans that is resisting both the material regulation of their daily lives and the dominant social construction of public housing as a racially gendered space suitable only for "dependent" women and children of color. Finally, there is a subordinate labor market niche hi California agriculture where indigenous Mixtec peasants from Oaxaca are displacing the more traditional mestizo farm workers, but who are also politically organizing as a transnational grassroots movement, pursuing a binational strategy to alleviate then- economic, political, and cultural marginality. Contributions and contributors include: "House People, Not Cars!" by Corey Dolgon, Michael Kline, and Laura Dresser; "Tranquillity City" by Tahnadge Wright; "Private Redevelopment and the Changing Forms of Displacement hi the East Village of New York" by Christopher Mele; "Resisting Racially Gendered Space" by Alma Young and Jyaphia Christos-Rodgers; and "Mixtecs and Mestizos hi California Agriculture" by Carol Zabin. This volume will be of interest to urban planners, sociologists, and political scientists, especially those with strong interests hi local ethnography and concrete policy.

This book addresses the questions of what went wrong with Detroit and what can be done to reinvent the Motor City. Various answers to the former deindustrialization, white flight, and a disappearing tax base are now well understood. Less discussed are potential paths forward, stemming from alternative explanations of Detroit's long-term decline and reconsideration of the challenges the city currently faces.Urban crisis‘socioeconomic, fiscal, and political has seemingly narrowed the range of possible interventions. Growth-oriented redevelopment strategies have not reversed Detroit's decline, but in the wake of crisis, officials have increasingly funnelled limited public resources into the city's commercial core via an implicit policy of "urban triage." The crisis has also led to the emergency management of the city by extra-democratic entities. As a disruptive historical event, Detroit's crisis is a moment teeming with political possibilities.The critical rethinking of Detroit's past, present, and future is essential reading for both urban studies scholars and the general public.

Cities are key sites of the transnational ties that increasingly connect people, places, and projects across the globe. They provide opportunities and constraints within which transnational actors and networks operate and nodes linking wider social formations traverse national borders. This book brings together a series of richly textured ethnographic studies that suggest new ways to situate and historicize transnationalism, identify new pathways to transnational urbanism, and map the contours of translocal, interregional, and diasporic connections not previously studied. The transnational ties treated in this book truly span the globe, giving concrete meaning to the phrase "globalization from below."How have the contributors to this book conceptualized the wider context informing the conduct of their ethnographically grounded, multi-sited research on the relationship between cities, migration, and transnationalism? Several interrelated contextual dimensions have been singled out as affecting the opportunities and constraints experienced by transnational migrant subjects. Socio-spatially, in several of these chapters, the political economic context now called neoliberal globalization is shown to be a key driving force creating conditions that necessitate, facilitate, or impede migration, foster trans-local economic ties, and create new inter-regional interdependencies--e.g., new South-South and East-East transnational ties.The changing historical context of both migrating groups and the cities and regions they move across are central to the study of the interplay of urban change and migrant transnationalism. The historical particularities of migrant recruitment, migration histories, migratory narratives, and changing gender and class relations all affect the character and geography of transnational migration with an impact on the social structures of community formation. This is a pioneering effort in the Comparative Urban and Community Research series.

Expansion of transnational capital and mass media to even the remotest of places has provoked a spate of discourse on transnationalism. A core theme hi this debate is the penetration of national cultures and political systems by global and local driving forces. The nation-state is seen as weakened by transnational capital, global media, and emergent supranational political institutions. It also faces the decentering local resistances of the informal economy, ethnic nationalism, and grass-roots activism. Transnationalism From Below brings together a rich combination of theoretical and grounded studies of transnational processes and practices, discussing both their positive and negative aspects.The editors examine the scope and limits of transnationalism. The volume is divided into four parts: "Theorizing Transnationalism"; "Transnational Economic and Political Agency"; "Constructing Transnational Localities"; and "Transnational Practices and Cultural Reinscription." Contriburtors include Andre C. Drainville, Josephine Smart, Alan Smart, Minna Nyberg S0rensen, George Fouron, Nina Glick Schiller, Luin Goldring, Sarah J. Mahler, Linda Miller Matthei, Louisa Schein, David A. Smith, and Robert C. Smith. Moving easily between micro and macro analyses, this book expands the boundaries of the current scholarship on transnationalism, locates new forms of transnational agency, and poses provocative questions that challenge prevailing interpretations of globalization. Transnationalism From Below is a pioneering collection that will make a significant addition to the libraries of anthropologists, sociologists, international relations specialists, urban planners, political scientists, and policymakers.

Cities are key sites of the transnational ties that increasingly connect people, places, and projects across the globe. They provide opportunities and constraints within which transnational actors and networks operate and nodes linking wider social formations traverse national borders. This book brings together a series of richly textured ethnographic studies that suggest new ways to situate and historicize transnationalism, identify new pathways to transnational urbanism, and map the contours of translocal, interregional, and diasporic connections not previously studied. The transnational ties treated in this book truly span the globe, giving concrete meaning to the phrase "globalization from below."How have the contributors to this book conceptualized the wider context informing the conduct of their ethnographically grounded, multi-sited research on the relationship between cities, migration, and transnationalism? Several interrelated contextual dimensions have been singled out as affecting the opportunities and constraints experienced by transnational migrant subjects. Socio-spatially, in several of these chapters, the political economic context now called neoliberal globalization is shown to be a key driving force creating conditions that necessitate, facilitate, or impede migration, foster trans-local economic ties, and create new inter-regional interdependencies--e.g., new South-South and East-East transnational ties.The changing historical context of both migrating groups and the cities and regions they move across are central to the study of the interplay of urban change and migrant transnationalism. The historical particularities of migrant recruitment, migration histories, migratory narratives, and changing gender and class relations all affect the character and geography of transnational migration with an impact on the social structures of community formation. This is a pioneering effort in the Comparative Urban and Community Research series.

This book addresses the questions of what went wrong with Detroit and what can be done to reinvent the Motor City. Various answers to the former—deindustrialization, white flight, and a disappearing tax base—are now well understood. Less discussed are potential paths forward, stemming from alternative explanations of Detroit's long-term decline and reconsideration of the challenges the city currently faces.Urban crisis—socioeconomic, fiscal, and political—has seemingly narrowed the range of possible interventions. Growth-oriented redevelopment strategies have not reversed Detroit's decline, but in the wake of crisis, officials have increasingly funnelled limited public resources into the city's commercial core via an implicit policy of "urban triage." The crisis has also led to the emergency management of the city by extra-democratic entities. As a disruptive historical event, Detroit's crisis is a moment teeming with political possibilities.The critical rethinking of Detroit's past, present, and future is essential reading for both urban studies scholars and the general public.

For over three decades, urban theorist Michael Peter Smith has engaged in constructing innovative theories on central research questions in urban studies. This book brings together his views on the state of urban theory, sorting out the changing strengths and weaknesses in the field.  Smith refocuses attention on the cultural, social, and political practices of urban inhabitants, particularly the way in which their everyday activities have contributed to the social construction of new ethnic identities and new meanings of urban citizenship. Combining the methods of political economy and transnational ethnography, he encourages us to think about new political spaces for practicing "urban citizenship" by analyzing the connections linking cities to the web of relations to other localities in which they are embedded.  Smith systematically analyzes the dynamics of "community power" and "urban change" under new globalizing trends and increased transnational mobility. Expanding on his original conceptualization of "transnational urbanism," he frames urban political life within a wider transnational context of political practice, in which an endless interplay of distinctly situated networks, social practices, and power relations are fought out at multiple scales, in an inexorable politics of inclusion and exclusion.

Michael Peter Smith is distinguished research professor in Community Studies at the University of California, Davis. He is co-author of the award-winning book Citizenship across Borders, and is the series editor of Transaction’s Comparative Urban and Community Research book series.