Urban and Regional Economics

The process of urbanization in the Global South presents several challenges for various traditions of economic theory.

In Asia, some of the characteristics to be examined relate to:

1. rapid urbanization which is neither driven nor accompanied by increasing industrialization;
2. the predominance and growth of informality in several spheres of the economy;
3. the growth of the peri-urban regions;
4. the emergence of complex structures of governance of the city;
5. the role of technology that shapes the landscape and the daily life of cities from modern buildings to structures and surveillance tools;
6. the emergence of “ghost” and “private” cities as a direction for the surplus of construction industry and for global financial capital.

In a broader sense, considering the context of different Asian countries, the process of urbanization can only be understood and analyzed in terms of the dialectical socio-economic relationship between urban and rural contexts: rural-urban continuum. The movement of capital, labor and commodities between these two spheres plays a central role in development of the Asian economies.

This call for papers is motivated by the growing interest in the study and theorization of urban processes within the developing world in the field of social sciences. The sessions aim to gather perspectives from different cities of the Global South, mainly but not restricted to the Asian region, examining different dimensions of these processes. We invite submissions on the following and related topics:

• Neoliberalism and urban development
• Interrelations between informality and city space
• Urban governance
• Urban and rural socio-economic relationship
• Rural - urban migration, urban work, refugeeness and belonging
• Urbanization, industrialization, and Special Economic Zones
• Growth of the services sector and spatial reconfiguration
• Technology, its different forms, and (re)structuring of daily life in cities
• Urban sprawl and peripheralization
• Urban inequalities, spatial segregation, and civic life
• Safety, justice and freedom in city spaces
• Slum eviction and rehabilitation
• Emerging environmental concerns in urban spaces
• Changing modalities of urban commons
• Political economy of urban transport

We encourage submissions that seek inter- and trans-disciplinary discussions on one or more of the topics listed above, among other themes.

About the Urban and Regional Economics Working Group

The Urban and Regional Economics Working Group explores the role of geographical space on economics and development, as well as the role of cities and the emerging importance of the political economy of urbanization.

HOW TO APPLY

To submit your abstract to this call, go to https://ysd.ineteconomics.org/rc. In your abstract, please clearly identify your research question, elaborate on methodology, and list your preliminary findings and/or tentative conclusions.

Apply here: https://ysd.ineteconomics.org/rc
Note: you must be logged into the YSI website to apply.
Deadline: 17 March 2019
Contact: [email protected]