Alexander von Humboldt Lectures 2014-2015:
Spatial Justice
The Alexander von Humboldt lectures are an initiative of Prof. Huib Ernste
Series organisers: Prof. Huib Ernste, dr. Karel Martens, dr. Olivier Kramsch, dr. Bart van Leeuwen
Click here for a more detailed description of this year’s theme.
See also: www.ru.nl/humboldt
The Department of Human Geography, Spatial Planning and Environmental Politics and the Department of Political Science at the Radboud University of Nijmegen cordially invite you to our Lecture and Seminar Series on the theme of ‘Spatial Justice’. The following Alexander von Humboldt Guests take part in our programme (clicking on a name will bring you to their personal homepage; clicking on ‘programme’ will bring you to the respective part of the programme):
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Mon. 08.09.14 free entry |
Opening Lecture Master Programme Human Geography 2014-15:
‘Just the City’
Abstract: Across many cities of the so-called Global South, the primary responsibility for constructing spaces of inhabitation fell largely to residents themselves. Although these cities have been largely remade through the intensive segregations precipitated by property markets, many substantial traces of the continuous incremental renovations and readjustment of everyday life remain vital. It was not just a matter of households building their own homes. Affordability meant density. Densification was not just of bodies of techniques necessary to provide an array of affordances. This meant- the intermixing of measures, angles, calculations, impulses, screens, surfaces, soundscapes, exposures, folds, circuitries, and layers, as instruments for associating things, bringing things into association, where things get their “bearings” by having a “bearing” on each other. But these association required their own rhythm and time. Focusing on different heterogeneous districts in inner city Jakarta, the article explores these mixtures of temporality and how they are materialised in local built and economic environments. After the lecture we have the opportunity to have an informal gathering together with drinks together with Prof. Abdoumaliq Simone. |
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Wed. free entry |
Alexander von Humboldt Lecture:
‘Justice in the Neo-liberal City’
Abstract: From the middle 1970s the restructuring of the global economy has undermined comprehensive planning. A sharp increase in the mobility of capital and labour has made public planning and control difficult. The final collapse of the Soviet empire buried its counter model to capitalism; so too did the Chinese conversion to a form of state capitalism. Accompanying these transformation has been the increasing dominance of a neo-liberal ideology ideology of market rationality, economic growth, and competitiveness—of necessary and inevitable competition among people, cities, regions or whole nations. The result has been a concerted attack on public-sector urban programs aimed at providing a reasonable standard of living for all residents. In particular, programs for social housing were severely cut back throughout Western Europe. An examination of recent policy in New York, Amsterdam and Singapore indicates the character of government programs in these wealthy but increasingly unequal cities. Their evolution will be evaluated in relation to principles of justice, as developed in the book The Just City. Finally some proposals for moving toward more just outcomes will be presented. |
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Thur. free entry |
Science Café with Prof. Susan Fainstein
Special guest: Prof. Marcel Wissenburg (Radboud University) Moderator: dr. Bart van Leeuwen (Radboud University) |
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Fri. free entry |
Seminar with Prof. Susan Fainstein
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Mo. free entry |
Alexander von Humboldt Lecture:
‘Divided cities: inequality and urban injustice’
Abstract: If the future of the planet is urban, is the future of the city one of worsening inequality? Recent urban analysis has highlighted the growing share of the global population that now lives in cities; this lecture puts that growth in the context of another major urban trend: deepening patterns of inequality in many cities across the world. In this context ‘older’ bases of urban inequality – access to land and property, gender inequity, ethnic and racial discrimination, legal exclusion and informality – intersect with emerging patterns of disparity which include extreme concentrations of wealth at the top, middle-class stagnation, privatisation and secession, and acute insecurity. Urban inequality today is not only a question of why so many people remain poor in the city, but also of the numbers stuck in an increasingly precarious ‘middle’, and why a significant minority are getting very, very rich. Accelerated wealth at the top, stagnation at the middle, and entrenched deprivation at the bottom all play their part in creating unequal urban futures, and in shaping patterns of spatial division in contemporary cities in both very brutal and less visible ways. At a fundamental level, inequality is crucial to thinking about the possibilities of a ‘just’ city, and the issue of whose city that is imagined to be. Common rights to the city, and competing claims to territory and to urban privilege, fracture around fissures of class, culture, race and belonging. Urban inequality is not only about blunt measures of disparity but about complex relations of injustice, domination and exclusion. To engage with contemporary urban inequalities, then, is to engage with the politics of cities and citizenship in an extended way; one which includes formal structures of government and legal arrangements, but which also bears on urban conflict and segregation, exploitation and expropriation, and the everyday politics of living in divided and disparate cities. |
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Tue. free entry |
Science Café with Prof. Fran Tonkiss
Special guest: dr. Lothar Smith (Radboud University) Moderator: Prof. Arnoud Lagendijk |
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Wed. free entry |
Seminar with Prof. Fran Tonkiss
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Mo. free entry |
Alexander von Humboldt Lecture:
‘Informal Settlement Upgrading in Global Mega-cities: The Human Rights – Property Rights Dilemma’
Abstract: Since 2008 we have, for the first time in human history, become an urban planet. And the continuing rate of urbanization is staggering. It is estimated that globally over 1 million people per week are migrating from the countryside to the city, primarily in Africa and Asia. Many of these migrants settle in the informal settlements (slums) of the planet’s mega-cities – e.g. Jakarta, Indonesia, Johannesburg, South Africa, Mexico City, Mumbai, India, Nairobi, Kenya. The U.N. estimates that over 1 billion people live in informal settlements now and that this number will double by 2030. These lives of these settlers are “informal” because they have no legal title to the land and housing where they reside. Should they? Prominent advocates (e.g. Hernando de Soto) argue that doing so improves infrastructure and social services within the settlements, jump starts private sector economic development activities, and improves the public fiscal conditions of cities. Skeptics wonder if informal settlers either need or want private property rights, and are also concerned about the unintended consequences of informal settlement upgrading. This talk explores spatial justice for informal settlers and settlements through the lens of human rights. Does a global discourse about furthering human rights imply that these settlers are entitled to property rights? And if they are, exactly what might this mean – what would property look like, how would they get it, what could they do with it? |
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Tue. free entry |
Science Café with Prof. Harvey Jacobs
Special Guest: Prof. Thomas Mertens (Radboud University) Moderator: Prof. Henk van Houtum (Radboud University) |
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Wed. free entry |
Seminar with Prof. Harvey Jacobs
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Mo. free entry |
Alexander von Humboldt Lecture:
‘Disadvantage, choice and spatial justice’
Abstract: Most of us live as though our lives are guided by choice. For example, we choose where to live, where we prefer to work or send our child to school, and how we would like to spend our free time. Much of the time, too, our choices overlap with others whose proximity or shared backgrounds and interests converge with our own. Out of these arise the fruits of voluntary association, the normative good of expressing our interests and spending our time with others as we see fit. But involuntary mechanisms also shape – often in profound ways – the choices that we all make. After all, no one chooses their parents, their skin colour, their first language, their income, and countless other factors that shape our choices. The involuntary appears to constrain the voluntary. How, then, do we speak about choice in a meaningful way? How indeed for those who are more disadvantaged and stigmatised in the societies they live in? In this talk Merry will take up this challenge and attempt to reconcile – to the extent possible – the voluntary and the involuntary and explore some pragmatic strategies for dealing with spatial injustice. |
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Tue. 02.12.14 free entry |
Science Café with Prof. Michael Merry
Special Guest: n.n. (to be confirmed) Moderator: dr. Karel Martens |
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Wed. free entry |
Seminar with Prof. Michael Merry with contributions by:
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Mo. free entry |
Alexander von Humboldt Lecture:
‘Space, justice and politics’
Abstract: This lecture is organised around the relationship between space, justice and politics. My starting point and empirical examples derive from contemporary urban uprisings in the liberal democracies of the west. The argument is that contemporary urban processes produce injustices and forms of dissent that elude the established institutions of liberal democracies. How can these forms of dissent be addressed without recourse to coercive ways? How, in this context, can we reconsider the relationship between the production of urban space, politics and justice? |
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Tue. free entry |
Science Café with Prof. Mustafa Dikec
Special Guest: dr. Olivier Kramsch (Radboud University) Moderator: Henk-Jan Kooij |
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Wed. free entry |
Seminar with Prof. Mustafa Dikec with contributions by:
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Subscribed to the Google Groups “Alexander von Humboldt Lectures” group. Go to
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The Routledge handbook on informal urbanization 
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