From Critical Urban Theory to the Right to the City

CITY, VOL. 13, NOS. 2–3, JUNE–SEPTEMBER 2009 From critical urban theory to the right to the city

Peter Marcuse

Taylor and Francis

The right to the city is becoming, in theory and in practice, a widespread, effective formulation of a set of demands to be actively thought through and pursued. But whose right, what right and to what city? Each question is examined in turn, first in the historical context of 1968 in which Henri Lefebvre first popularized the phrase, then in its meaning for the guidance of action. The conclusion suggests that exposing, proposing and politicizing the key issues can move us closer to implementing this right.

I. Introduction: overview and definitions important words and concepts. (One might argue that ‘theory and practice’ are really he main concern of this paper is only one word in this context, but that’s what I take to be the ultimate truer in theory than in practice.) T purpose of critical urban theory: ‘Critical’ I take to be, among other implementing the demand for a Right to things, shorthand for an evaluative attitude the City. But that is a demand, a goal, that towards reality, a questioning rather than an needs definition. Whose right is it about, acceptance of the world as it is, a taking what right is it and to what city? The paper apart and examining and attempting to begins with a look at the actual problems understand the world. It leads to a position that people face today, and then looks at not only necessarily critical in the sense of them in their historical context, focusing negative criticism, but also critically expos- on the difference between the crisis of 1968, ing the positive and the possibilities of which produced the demand for the Right change, implying positions on what is to the City, and the crisis we confront wrong and needing change, but also on Downloaded By: [Queen Mary & Westfield College] At: 18:01 24 September 2010 today. The question then is: how do we what is desirable and needs to be built on understand the Right to the City today, and fostered. and how can a critical urban theory ‘Urban’ I take to be shorthand for the contribute to implementing it? The paper societal as congealed in cities today, and to suggests an approach to action that relies denote the point at which the rubber of the on three steps a critical theory could follow: personal hits the ground of the societal, the exposing, proposing and politicizing. The intersection of everyday life with the socially conclusion presents a perhaps far-fetched created systemic world about us. idea of what the possibilities for large-scale ‘Theory’ I take to be the attempt to under- and enduring social change might actually stand, to explain and to illuminate the mean- be today. Is another world not only possi- ing and possibilities of the world in which ble, but realistically attainable? practice takes place. It is, in a sense, the A word on the use of terms. ‘Critical’, conscious and articulated aspect of practice, ‘urban’, ‘theory’ and ‘practice’ are four of action. It is developed through action, and

in turn informs understanding and under- The election of Obama was seen as a girds practice. dramatic event, not only in the USA but in ‘Practice’ is often spoken of as if it were the world. What does it in fact mean? What the Siamese twin of theory, because it is has changed, and what has not? Answering needed for theory and because theory the question requires exactly critical theory. should lead to practice if it is taken seri- For the answer is, in conventional terms, ously. The image is of a theory and a prac- everything has changed, but as well, in critical tice that are linked organically, that a critical terms, nothing has changed—and it is the theory depends on a critical practice and a ability of critical theory to say what has and critical practice depends on a critical theory. what hasn’t changed that entitles it to an But it is not so simple. The Paris Commune, important place in our thinking and action. a classical example of critical practice, began What has changed is that the use of racism as with no ‘theory’, and leading exponents of a support for economic and social policies critical theory saw their work as Flaschen- that exploit and oppress has become counter- post, in Adorno’s words, analysis written productive, as racism is rejected by more and down and put in a bottle thrown in the more people (although not by all) as contrary ocean hoping it would some day be retrieved to their own experiences and values. And we and be useful. But it may have been one of still have institutional racism, so that for the failings of the mainstream of critical every dollar of wealth held by the typical theory that it saw itself evolving indepen- white family the African American family has dently of practice, and it may similarly have only ten cents (Lui, 2009, p. A15). What has been a weakness of some forms of critical not changed is the underlying structure of the action that they proceeded uninformed and society in which the election took place, even rejecting critical theory, as in the We neither politically—this was the most expen- Are the Poors approach (Desai, 2002) and in sive campaign in the history of the USA, and some forms of anarchist and communitarian the media’s role in it was enormous—nor action.1 economically—the Goldman Sachs crew who In any event, as used here, critical urban are running the national treasury, and their theory is taken as analysis that flows from economist academic minions, are running the the experience of practice in developing the Federal government’s economic role after potentials of existing urban society, and criti- Obama’s election as they did before, and the cal theory is intended to illuminate and $700 billion bail-out for the financial sector inform the future course of such practice. already authorized will be implemented in The sections that follow discuss the reality full, if not expanded. Even the staid New today and its history, the right to the city in York Times writes: Downloaded By: [Queen Mary & Westfield College] At: 18:01 24 September 2010 terms of whose right, what right and what city, solutions in terms of the formulation ‘Goldman’s presence in the [US Treasury] Expose, Propose, Politicize and finally, department is so ubiquitous that other getting to the goal. bankers and competitors have given the star- studded firm a new nickname; Government Sachs.’ (Creswell and White, 2008, p. 1) II. The reality today and its history Another aspect of the US presidential elec- Today tion campaign that led up to the election result is noteworthy, and ties in with a major As this is written, two developments shape argument I want to make here. Both parties the context for our analysis: the election of ran under the slogan of ‘Change’; Obama’s Barack Obama as president of the USA and was ‘Change you can believe in’, McCain the deepening economic crisis globally. highlighted his maverick, non-conformist MARCUSE: FROM CRITICAL URBAN THEORY TO THE RIGHT TO THE CITY 187

record every chance he got. Close to 50% system go. Calling greed ‘the profit motive’ is saw the change needed as being in one direc- a euphemism that tries to justify a system tion, close to 50% saw it in another, but that relies on greed to produce growth at the hardly anyone was satisfied with things as expense of all other values, and that stifles they are. If critical urban theory is able to creativity that does not serve profit. Anti- expose the roots of that dissatisfaction, and abortion activists, religious fundamentalists, show both almost equal halves that their defenders of ‘family values’, are as much a dissatisfaction is with the same features of the reflection of emotional impoverishment as economy, the politics, the society, it will have hunger and homelessness are of material done its job. deprivation. A society one-dimensional in The other development, already unfolding its driving force produces one-dimensional as the election took place, is the economic people, and struggles to be supported by crisis. I focus on the USA, but the picture them. The victims of the system include both is similar globally. In the USA today, over the materially deprived and the intellectually 6 million households (Credit Suisse, 2008) and socially alienated, as is explored below. face mortgage foreclosure, unemployment is The history of the Right to the City as a rising to a several decades-long high, home- slogan dealing with such problems came into less use of emergency shelters is at an all-time widespread usage largely out of the events— high in New York City, real wages are falling the theory and the practice—of May 1968 in way behind increases in productivity, the gap Paris, and their parallels worldwide. Further between rich and poor is growing. The finan- discussion requires a look at that history, cial crisis seems to be spreading, to engulf what preceded it, how it compares to the more and more people, to cause more and events of today. more unemployment, insecurity, hunger and want, a greater and greater dissatisfaction with conditions as they are, with inequality, History: before and after 1968 luxury in the midst of poverty, illiteracy, substantive as well as linguistic, selfishness in ‘Crisis?’ Capitalism has always been a system place of solidarity, isolation in place of love. with deep internal contradictions. Marxism But I think it is not a financial crisis spread- has had the investigation of crises at the ing to other parts of the economy that we center of its concerns, and its conclusions are confront, but an economy whose contradic- hardly likely to be disproven by current tions are erupting in a very visible manner in events. In the 20th century, five major crises, the financial sector, but only as manifesta- five periods of deep-going social turmoil, can tions of much more deep-seated contradic-

Downloaded By: [Queen Mary & Westfield College] At: 18:01 24 September 2010 be identified. They differ in their severity and tions which we should not allow to be consequences in the respective strengths concealed in the focus on issues of regulation and weaknesses of both the system’s critics or deregulation in one small excrescence of a and of its defenders—a critical point. The five fundamentally flawed system as a whole. The crises are: problem is not in unregulated credit default swaps or out of control hedge funds; the problem is in exploitation, domination, 1917: The crisis after the end of the First World War, and the victory of the repression system-wide. Russian revolution, the Weimar Fundamentally, the crisis comes from a Republic system that both necessarily produces gross 1929: The great depression, the triumph of material inequality and at the same time fascism, the New Deal produces gross insecurity and emotional 1968: The civil rights movement, the new discontent and distortions. Greed is not an left, the student protests, the Vietnam aberration of the system; it is what makes the War 188 CITY VOL. 13, NOS. 2–3

1990: The crisis of really existing socialism broad elements of the population with the in Eastern Europe and the Soviet frustrated potentials that they saw in society Union —in a sense, resting on injustice rather than, 2008: Today’s more-than-financial crisis. or in addition to, want. The contradiction between the reality and the potential for I mention three of these, 1917, 1929 and greater progress undermined really existing 1990, only to make an often forgotten point: socialism in the Stalinist period, but the the range of resolutions of crisis is a broad potential was even clearer in May 1968, in one, not confined to the kinds of questions Paris most prominently, but in April of that that seem to pre-empt public discourse year in universities in the USA and elsewhere today: do we regulate speculation or not, do also. In each case critical action represented a we increase welfare benefits or not, do we new element in the oppositional protest. For end this war or not, do we bail out this bank the first time on a significant scale, the agita- or this business or not, do we put up trade tion resulting from the aspirations of the barriers or take them down. Historically, the alienated were linked, if tenuously and in choices are much broader. As these earlier constant tension, with the demands of the crises have shown, at the extremes there lie, materially exploited: the claims of the and have always lain, socialism on the one students to the claims of the workers (see side, barbarism, in the modern form of Marcuse, 2008). Workers as a whole were not fascism, on the other. Neither extreme seems uniformly supportive, and the institutional- imminent today, if for different reasons—not ized organs of the working class opposed the socialism, for lack of a base that presses for it protests; yet worker support on the ground or might bring it about, and not fascism, was strong. because the forces of domination have found On the other hand, the state against which subtler and more insidious means of holding the protests were directed, the rulers, the on to power than naked violence.2 In each capitalists and the underwriters of the estab- crisis, the outcome has depended, not simply lishment, were strong. The context was not on the strength or weakness of the critical of economic crisis; the system was still, in my forces (and not the quality of their critical father’s phrase, producing the goods. And theory) but also on the strengths and weak- the goods it produced satisfied the majority; nesses of the established system. Indeed, one those aspiring to something more than those key function of critical theory may well be to goods remained a minority. The protest was expose and evaluate both the strengths and defeated. weaknesses of the existing system and the Today, in 2009, we have in a sense the ultimate nature of its crises, thus informing reverse situation. The system is shaky in its Downloaded By: [Queen Mary & Westfield College] At: 18:01 24 September 2010 practice as to what its strategic potential production of the goods, whose delivery actually is, as well as analyzing the strategies relies today more and more on financial that that practice might adopt. arrangements rather than direct home After 1917, none of these crises involved production within the national economy. more than sporadic violence, and all but 1929 Foreclosures are up dramatically, with close in Europe seemed in reality (if not always in to 4,000,000 threatened, unemployment is the minds of the participants) remote rising, local tax revenues and thus local from the extremes of communism and governmental services are shrinking, public fascism. But the crises of 1968 and 1990 were education is endangered, the security of different from the earlier ones in one key retirements is threatened as pension funds regard: they did not rest on the material lose large percentages of their value. And breakdown of the existing system, on the things are expected to get worse. depth of poverty or oppression or material The establishment’s response has been want, but on the combined dissatisfaction of widely and deeply unpopular. The largest MARCUSE: FROM CRITICAL URBAN THEORY TO THE RIGHT TO THE CITY 189

financial institutions have taken over the slogan, and a theoretically complex and national treasury quite directly in private provocative formulation. What does the hands, have in effect privatized the govern- Right to the City mean? More specifically: ment (quite a reversal of the nationalization of Whose Right are we talking about? What the banks of which Marx wrote in the Right is it we mean? What City is it to which Communist Manifesto). Goldman Sachs, one we want the right? of the largest of the private financial banking Henri Lefebvre popularized the slogan in and speculation firms, now has its members 1968, but he was more provocative than care- staffing the national treasury, distributing ful in its usage. The best definition he gave is: multiple billions of dollars to the biggest banks and financial institutions, those ‘… the right to the city is like a cry and a precisely that are universally recognized as demand. This right slowly meanders through having caused the immediate crisis to which the surprising detours of nostalgia and they are supposed to be responding. Insecu- tourism, the return to the heart of the traditional city, and the call of existent or rity is widespread and deep, and the rulers and recently developed centralities.’ (Lefebvre, their lackeys are almost apologetic in their 1967, p. 158) response; Alan Greenspan, as I write this, has admitted he ‘overestimated the market’. In other places he has it meandering through: Yet the protest has been subdued. Life on the campuses barely notices the crisis. Labor ‘the right to information, the rights to use of unions confine themselves to asking for multiple services, the right of users to make limits on CEO pay. Bernie Sanders, the one known their ideas on the space and time of socialist member of Congress (elected as an their activities in urban areas; it would also independent—socialist is not a label that can cover the right to the use of the center’. get you elected) speaks of nationalizing the (Lefebvre, 1991, p. 34) banks; no one listens. The media denounce the ‘greed’ of the bankers; no one blames the So: whose right, what right and to what city? banking system and its driving force, the accumulation of profit and expansion of capital. The left intelligentsia speaks to itself, Whose right? trying to figure out how deep the crisis is; the media erects a wall against fundamental ques- ‘Whose right’ is a complex question, and one tioning of the system. Socialism remains a as to which I think an expansion of the exist- bad word in US electoral politics, in which ing discussion would be worthwhile—useful the contenders shy away from it in unques- both theoretically and in practice. Downloaded By: [Queen Mary & Westfield College] At: 18:01 24 September 2010 tioning condemnation and speak only of The question is a long-standing one. regulation and renewed economic growth. Herbert Marcuse struggled with it (Marcuse, Critical urban theory can provide some illu- 1969). David Harvey (2009) recently called mination on why this situation exists. It has to attention to it in today’s context: do with the question of whose right to the city is involved, who the potential actors, the ‘I don’t think we are in a position to define ‘agents of change’, are and what moves them who the agents of change will be in the present conjuncture and it plainly will vary either to propose or to oppose basic change. from one part of the world to another. In the United States right now there are signs that elements of the managerial class, which has III. Right to the City lived off the earnings of finance capital all these years, is getting annoyed and may turn The Right to the City is both an immediately a bit radical. A lot of people have been laid off understandable and intuitively compelling in the financial services, in some instances 190 CITY VOL. 13, NOS. 2–3

they have even had their mortgages essential human needs. ‘Erst kommt das foreclosed. Cultural producers are waking up Fressen, dann kommt die Morale’, as Brecht to the nature of the problems we face and in said;3 but both are necessary for a human and the same way that the 1960s art schools were humane life. Where choices must be made, centers of political radicalism, you might find the demands of the deprived are entitled to something like that re-emerging. We may see priority over the fulfillment of the aspira- the rise of cross-border organizations as the reductions in remittances spread the crisis to tions of the alienated. places like rural Mexico or Kerala.’ To return then to whose rights are our concern, the demand is of those who are The analysis following is new, but I think it is excluded, the cry is of those who are alien- consistent with Lefebvre’s, and certainly ated; the demand is for the material necessities with my father’s. Lefebvre’s right is both a of life, the aspiration is for a broader right to cry and a demand, a cry out of necessity and what is necessary beyond the material to lead a demand for something more. Those are two a satisfying life. But to make the discussion separate things. I would reformulate them to clearer, let me digress briefly to a schematic be an exigent demand by those deprived of definition of terms.4 basic material and existing legal rights, and an An analysis in terms of material interests, in aspiration for the future by those discon- somewhat traditional class terms (see, for tented with life as they see it around them, instance, in urban terms: Marcuse, 1989) along perceived as limiting their own potentials for lines of position in the relations of production growth and creativity. (somewhat modernized), might be: The demand comes from those directly in want, directly oppressed, those for whom ● The excluded (not in fact an accurate term, even their most immediate needs are not for they are in fact a part of the system, fulfilled: the homeless, the hungry, the without the protections won by the work- imprisoned, the persecuted on gender, reli- ing class for labor, but they operate at its gious, racial grounds. It is an involuntary margins). demand, those whose work injures their ● The working class, the materially exploited health, those whose income is below subsis- (including what is euphemistically called tence. The cry comes from the aspiration of the middle class, i.e. white as well as blue those superficially integrated into the system collar workers, skilled as well as unskilled, and sharing in its material benefits, but service as well as manufacturing workers, constrained in their opportunities for but underpaid and producing profit for creative activity, oppressed in their social others)—together with the excluded, we relationships, guilty perhaps for an unde- may speak of these two groups as the Downloaded By: [Queen Mary & Westfield College] At: 18:01 24 September 2010 served prosperity, unfulfilled in their lives’ deprived. hopes. The discussion of the role of art, and ● The small business people (the individual of an aesthetic revulsion against the results of proprietors, the small entrepreneurs, the the existing order of things, is relevant craftsmen). (Miles, forthcoming). For both, their one- ● The gentry (including the more successful dimensionality eats away at their humanity, small business persons, professionals, the and from the same source, but it does it in highly paid servants of the multi-nationals). different ways. ● The capitalists (owners and decision- So that there is no misunderstanding, those making managers of large business deprived even of the material necessities of enterprises). life are as entitled to, and in need of, the fuller ● The establishment intelligentsia (including life to which the alienated aspire as are the much of the media, academics, artists and alienated, and the sources of dissatisfaction others active in the ideological aspect of for both arise out of equally organic and the production processes). MARCUSE: FROM CRITICAL URBAN THEORY TO THE RIGHT TO THE CITY 191

● The politically powerful (including most of Distressed’ (Ramirez and Cruz, 2009) can be those in or aspiring to high public office). interpreted as covering both material and cultural or intellectual distress. Overcoming Looked at economically, the cry for the that distance, with due priority for the Right to the City here comes from the most deprived and attention to the alienated, is marginalized and the most underpaid and high on what needs to be done today. insecure members of the working class, not It’s crucially important to be clear that it is from most of the gentry, the intelligentsia, not everyone’s right to the city with which the capitalists. we are concerned, but that there is in fact a An analysis in ‘cultural’ terms, along lines conflict among rights that need to be faced of relation to the dominant cultural, ethnic, and resolved, rather than wished away. Some and gendered society and ideology, might be: already have the right to the city, are running it now, have it well in hand (although ‘well’ ● The directly oppressed (oppressed along might not be just the right word, today!). lines of race, ethnicity, gender, lifestyle, They are the financial powers, the real estate often called the excluded, but excluded owners and speculators, the key political only in this ‘cultural’ sense, often included hierarchy of state power, the owners of the in an economic sense). media. ● The alienated (of any economic class, It is the right to the city of those who do many youth, artists, a significant part of not now have it with which we are the intelligentsia, in resistance to the concerned. But that is not a useful answer. It dominant system as preventing adequate is necessary to know who is most deeply satisfaction of their human needs). affected, who is likely to lead the fight, who ● The insecure (a shifting group, varying will be most likely to support it, what will with conjunctural changes, e.g. level of their reasons be? Contributing to under- crisis, prosperity, including much of the standing exactly who that is is a contribution working class and periodically some of the critical urban theory should attempt to make. gentry). I suggest here it is a combination of the ● The hapless lackeys of power (including deprived and the discontented who will lead some of the gentry and some of the the push for the Right to the City, but the intelligentsia). issue can use a lot more attention. ● The underwriters and beneficiaries of the Specifically, I would argue that discon- established cultural and ideological hege- tent, and for that matter deprivation, does monic attitudes and beliefs. not automatically lead to support for the claim to the right to the city for all Downloaded By: [Queen Mary & Westfield College] At: 18:01 24 September 2010 Looked at from this point of view, the deprived and alienated. The threat of demand for the Right to the City comes from discontent, especially when coupled with the directly oppressed, the aspiration comes fear of unrest from the deprived and the from the alienated. working class, has always worried those on Demand and aspiration, deprivation and top (‘A specter is haunting Europe …’). discontent. The demand led to the Russian The effort to channel that discontent has Revolution, the aspiration led to the fall of been a chief task for the lackeys of power, the Berlin wall. The demand and the aspira- the manipulators of ideology, with the tion both surfaced, rather independently, in media, the schools, religious institutions, 1968 (see above), but failed to come fully and a variety of business and civic organiza- together; the distance between the deprived tions as their allies/targets. The results are and the alienated remained. The description seen in a variety of widespread emotional of the World Social Forum’s meeting in group-based phenomena, circling around Belem in 2009 as ‘The Gathering of the issues such as: 192 CITY VOL. 13, NOS. 2–3

● Anti-abortion and right to life strikingly at its meeting in Belem about the ● The right to hold guns nature of that gathering, suggest that a broad ● Anti-tax measures theoretical understanding along the above ● Homophobia lines might help clarify that it is a single ● Racism conflict in which all participating groups are ● Anti-immigrant sentiment engaged, with a single objective, even though ● Religious fundamentalism the immediate form may be only that of a ● Family values forum (where sympathetic groups around ● Chauvinist war-mongering varying issues come together to exchange ● False patriotism experiences and debate), or of a coalition (a ● Elements of sports fanaticism. temporary coming together around specific temporally and spatially limited issues), or of And, I would argue: an alliance (a more permanent coalition), or of a movement (less organized, less clear in ● Home ownership as the American Dream. its ultimate goals but very clear in its solidarity and concerned with multiple issues), an It is tempting to use Freudian terms for the assembly (a single, or many single, coming process, repression of discontent and its togethers of multiple groups for varying sublimation in these emotional phenomena, a levels of common thinking, sharing, action). cathexis in which emotion is attached to There are other formulations: networks, these issues and removed from more danger- cross-network convergence, network of ous discontents, or even realization of networks (Costello and Smith, 2009), but discontent (H. Marcuse, 1955; Zizek, 2008). these are formulations that beg the question A direct confrontation with this repression/ of what kind of coming together a ‘network’ sublimation may have to be a very concrete is—convergence on what, around what? The part of any practical political action to argument here is that there is a convergence achieve real change. of all groups, coalitions, alliances, move- So I would argue people affected by these ments, assemblies around a common set of phenomena are also among the deprived and objectives, which see capitalism as the the discontented, but the direction of their common enemy and the right to the city as reaction is quite opposite. It is the basis for their common cause. the old formulation that the future lies between socialism and barbarism—it is they that provide the base for the barbarism, the What right? ‘national socialism’, but it is a base that can Downloaded By: [Queen Mary & Westfield College] At: 18:01 24 September 2010 be addressed in a progressive manner also. The right to the city is a claim and a banner The battle thus becomes ever more a battle under which to mobilize one side in the of ideology, understanding, grounded in conflict over who should have the benefit of material oppression but not limited to it, the city and what kind of city it should be. combining the demands of the oppressed It is a moral claim, founded on fundamental with the aspirations of the alienated. principles of justice, of ethics, of morality, of The organizational form of that opposition virtue, of the good. ‘Right’ is not meant as a needs exploration. Clearly the view that it legal claim enforceable through a judicial will be the proletariat that, as a single class, process today (although that may be part of leads the struggle with the aid of some intel- the claim as a step in the direction of realiz- lectuals is outdated. If in the process of strug- ing the Right to the City). Rather, it is gle, social blocs, à la Gramsci, can develop, multiple rights that are incorporated here: something solid will have been achieved. The not just one, not just a right to public space, present debates in the World Social Forum, or a right to information and transparency MARCUSE: FROM CRITICAL URBAN THEORY TO THE RIGHT TO THE CITY 193

in government, or a right to access to the Robert Park’s phrase: ‘the city of heart’s center, or a right to this service or that, but desire’. the right to a totality, a complexity, in which But first, as a precondition for pursuing each of the parts is part of a single whole to what is desired, a city where material needs which the right is demanded. The homeless and aspirational needs are met, the needs of person in Los Angeles has not won the right the deprived and of the alienated, clarity—up to the city when he is allowed to sleep on a to a point—should be sought as to what such park bench in the center. Much more is a city would look like. involved, and the concept is as to a collectiv- The principles that such a city would ity of rights, not individualistic rights. incorporate can be set forth in general. They The demand is made as a right not only in would include concepts such as justice, a legal sense but also in a moral sense, a equity, democracy, the full development of claim not only to a right as to justice within human potentials or capabilities, to all the existing legal system but a right on a according to their needs, from all according higher moral plane that claims a better to their abilities, the recognition of human system in which the demands can be fully differences. They would include terms such and entirely met. as sustainability and diversity, but these are rather desiderata in the pursuit of goals rather than goals in themselves. What city? But there is a limit to how much benefit can be gained from trying to spell those prin- Lefebvre is quite clear on this: it is not the ciples out in clear terms today.5 Such a city is right to the existing city that is demanded, not to be predicted in detail, as Lefebvre but the right to a future city, indeed not often said (indeed, following Marx and necessarily a city in the conventional sense at Engels, in opposition to the early utopians— all, but a place in an urban society in which see Engels, 1880). the hierarchical distinction between the city and the country has disappeared. The ‘To the extent that the contours of the future demand of the landless farmer in the Amazon city can be outlined, it could be defined by in Brazil is not met by giving him entrée to a imagining the reversal of the current situation, by pushing to its limits the favela in the middle of Rio de Janeiro. As converted image of the world upside down.’ Lefebvre (1967, p. 158) has it: (Lefebvre, 1967, p. 172)

‘The right to the city cannot be conceived of as a simple visiting right or as a return to IV. Solutions: expose, propose, politicize

Downloaded By: [Queen Mary & Westfield College] At: 18:01 24 September 2010 traditional cities.’ Given the problems we face today, what are And in fact not a city at all, but a whole soci- the solutions? More specifically for purposes ety. The ‘urban’ is only a synecdoche and a of this discussion, what is the contribution metaphor, in Lefebvre (1967, pp. 158, 45): that critical urban theory can make to those solutions? How can theory inform and help ‘[The right to the city] can only be practice—for, while in theory, theory and formulated as a transformed and renewed right to urban life.’ practice are one, in practice there are real differences, if only that the development of ‘… this from this point on I will no longer theory and the leadership in practice largely refer to the city but to the urban’. reside in different people, different occupa- tions, different life histories. Our common Harvey (2003) formulates well what such a task, those privileged (to be honest about it) city/society might be in principle; he uses to work in the realm of theory, and those 194 CITY VOL. 13, NOS. 2–3

differently privileged to be able to lead in the a totality, to something whole and some- realm of practice, our task is to make that thing wholly different from the existing city, link between theory and practice and to the existing society. Lefebvre and most of make it productive. In other words, how do those on the streets of Paris and in the occu- we go from critical urban theory to radical pied buildings of Columbia in 1968 might urban practice? call it socialism or communism, but it has In my own field, urban planning, an exam- various names: a democratic society (Purcell, ination of what planning in New Orleans 2008), or a society supporting strivings for was doing in the aftermath of hurricane life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, Katrina led to a suggestion for an approach as in the US Declaration of Independence, I called Critical Planning, and outlined an or for liberty, equality, fraternity, as in approach in three steps:6 they could be the French Revolution, or a just society summarized in three words: Expose, Propose (Fainstein, 2009) or a humane one or one and Politicize. Expose in the sense of analyz- allowing for the full development of the ing the roots of the problem and making human capabilities (Nussbaum, 1999; also clear and communicating that analysis to developed by Fainstein, 2009), the potential those that need it and can use it. Propose, in of humans as a species being (Marx, 1844). the sense of working with those affected to What all of these formulations must imply, come up with actual proposals, programs, if the analysis of critical urban theory is targets, strategies, to achieve the desired correct, is a fundamental rejection of the results. Critical urban theory should help prevailing capitalist system. What all but the deepen the exposé, help formulate responses most old-fashioned utopian proposals also that address the root causes thus exposed, have in common is a rejection of the idea and demonstrate the need for a politicized that the most desirable future can be spelled response. Politicize, in the sense of clarifying out, designed, defined, now, in advance, the political action implications of what was except in the most broad principles. Only in exposed and proposed, and supporting orga- the experience of getting there, in the demo- nizing around the proposals by informing cratic decisions that accompany the process, action. Politicizing includes attention to can a better future be formed. It is not for issues of organization strategy and day-to- lack of imagination or inadequate attention day politics. And where appropriate, it or failing thought that no more concrete includes supporting organization directly picture is presented, but because, precisely, with interventions in the media and some- the direction for actions in the future should times raising issues within the critic’s peer not be preempted, but left to the democratic groups themselves, often academics. experience of those in fact implementing the Downloaded By: [Queen Mary & Westfield College] At: 18:01 24 September 2010 vision. Can an alternative to capitalism really be V. The goal of the Right to the City, and accomplished, given the proven power of the how we get there? established system?7 Not only is the end product hard to imagine, but the steps lead- If this is the strategy for action using critical ing there are hard to see; anything now on urban theory and practice, what exactly is its the agenda seems trivial in such a long-term ultimate goal? So a comment or two on just perspective. Many believe that spaces of what exactly is the vision of the society hope, in David Harvey’s formulation (2000), towards which pursuing the Right to the can be found, and many such spaces indeed City implicitly reads. move in the direction of broader change. Most immediately, the goal can be read There is perhaps general agreement, by Marx, from the main immediate contribution of Lefebvre, my father, Harvey and most think- the Right to the City: the claim is a claim to ing people, that the seeds of the future must MARCUSE: FROM CRITICAL URBAN THEORY TO THE RIGHT TO THE CITY 195

be found in the present. But what does that, or further accumulation, but rather decent apart from the spatial conceptualization, living conditions for all. Thus the culturally exactly mean? alienated and the immediately deprived have A spatial image for the seeds of the future a common enemy. And that is increasingly can be helpful (Pinder, 2005; Miles, 2007) and recognized, even if its name is not always the whatever is done will surely have a spatial same: capitalism, neoliberalism, greed, multi- aspect also.8 But a spatial focus has its dangers nationals, power elite, the bourgeoisie, the too: most problems have a spatial aspect, but capitalist class. Above all, eliminating profit their origins lie in economic, social, political as means and motivation in the political arenas, the spatial being a partial cause and an sector, eliminating the role of wealth and the aggravation, but only partial. It might be power linked to it from public decisions, is a better to see the seeds of the future as sectors. key requirement for both the immediately It is clearly possible to have sectors of every- oppressed and the alienated. day life that are free of capitalist forms, The logic of attempting to expel that enemy operating within the capitalist system but not from everyday life, one sector at a time, is of it, not dominated by it. For shorthand, appealing. We are moving in that direction, those are the sectors of the economy and of although the present leadership is only being daily life that are not operated on the profit dragged there reluctantly, in health care and in system, that are within it but not of it, that are education, two sectors in which the conflict not motivated by profit but rely on solidarity, over private vs. public has turned, if only humanity, the flexing of muscles and the slightly, in favor of public. The opportunity is development of creative impulses, for their there in housing. The economic crisis has own sake. They will need to draw resources certainly expanded the government’s role in from the for-profit sector, preferably demo- finance, banking, real estate, if always within cratically and openly through government, conservative ideological limits. but their own driving force will be found in A critical urban theory, dedicated to general principles that are radically different supporting a right to the city, needs to expose from those motivating the for-profit econ- the common roots of the deprivation and omy, and principles that can have increas- discontent, and to show the common nature ingly wider visibility and appeal. of the demands and the aspirations of the Such sectors, such areas of activity, already majority of the people. A critical urban theory exist, are well known, are sought after. The can develop the principles around which the aspirations of those who are alienated from deprived and the alienated can make common capitalism lead in this direction. Artists cause in pursuit of the Right to the City. How create, teachers teach, inventors invent, to politicize most effectively that common Downloaded By: [Queen Mary & Westfield College] At: 18:01 24 September 2010 philosophers think, young people volunteer, ground? We already have sectors of society not for profit, but because they believe that is where the commonality is visible, where what life is for, that is what they want to do. action for people, not for profit, is the rule. They come up against the same constraints Think of (unfortunately only some) educa- that make people homeless, hungry, sick, tion. Think of (unfortunately only some) impoverished, people whose demands thus health care. Think of (unfortunately only naturally link with the aspirations of the some) of the arts. Think of space exploration. alienated. The ultimate goal of most social Think of the environmental movement. Think movements, and certainly of the Right to the of the non-profit and cooperative sector in City movement, necessarily leads in this housing. Think of the effort to deepen democ- direction: they are not after profit, but seek a racy and expand participation in public deci- decent and supportive living environment. sions, and limit or abolish the role of money Profit, if a concern at all, is a means to an end, in elections and governmental decisions. In which is not high consumption, social status each of these, the slogan of CITIES FOR PEOPLE, 196 CITY VOL. 13, NOS. 2–3

NOT FOR PROFIT, resonates. Let that be the 7 For a recent honest, thoughtful, approach to an political cry that embodies the nature of the answer, see Ehrenreich and Fletcher (2009). 8 city to which the right is being claimed. Let it 8 See the forthcoming publication of the proceedings of the Nanterre conference on Spatial Justice, and be the cry that forms a noose about one part the journal that developed from it. of the capitalist system after another. Rudi Dutschke, at the peak of the 1968 movement in Germany, spoke of the ‘long march References through the institutions’. Let us pick them off, separately or together. Let us tighten the Costello, T. and Smith, B. (2009) ‘WSF: is another world noose around the housing system, and move possible?’, The Nation, 13 February. to squeeze the profit out of it, one sector at a Credit Suisse (2008) ‘Foreclosures to affect 6.5 mln loans time. The subprime mortgage crisis, for exam- by 2012’, Reuters report, 22 April, http:// ple, could be an opportunity to move again in www.reuters.com/article/bondsNews/ idUSN2233380820080422 that direction (Marcuse, forthcoming), as Creswell, J. and White, B. (2008) ‘The guys from social housing was before it. Let us not be “Government Sachs”’, The New York Times, 19 afraid to name the common goal, and the October, Business Section. common enemy. Desai, A. (2002) We Are the Poors, Community A critical urban theory, internally linked Struggles in Post-Apartheid South Africa. New York: Monthly Review Press. to practice, might help get there. Ehrenreich, B. and Fletcher, B. (2009) ‘Can we still use the “S” word?’, The Nation, March. Engels, F. (1880) Socialism: Utopian and Scientific. Notes Moscow: Progress. Fainstein, S. (2009) ‘Planning and the just city’, in P. 1 I am aware that the school known as critical theory Marcuse, J. Connolly, J. Novy, I. Olivo, C. Potter comes at the critical from a different direction, but it and J. Steil (eds) Searching for the Just City. Oxford: is one which, I believe, inevitably leads to this Routledge, pp. 19–39. position. I suspect that the root of the differences Harvey, D. (2000) Spaces of Hope. Berkeley: University between my father and Adorno in the Vietnam era of California Press. was in Adorno’s unwillingness to deal with the Harvey, D. (2003) ‘The right to the city’, International issue of the seeds and movements for change, Journal of Urban and Regional Research 27(4), pp. which had become my father’s major concern. 939–994. 2 Underneath, violence still plays a role, as the level Harvey, D. (2009) http://www.counterpunch.org/ of incarceration in the USA shows, as does right- weisbrot03062009.html wing violence against opposition, both left-wing Lefebvre, H. (1991) ‘Les illusions de la modernite’, in I. and/cultural non-conformists, shows. Ramoney, J. Decornoy, and Ch. Brie (eds) La ville 3 ‘First comes eating, then comes morality.’ partout et partout en crise, Manière de voir, 13. 4 Iris Marion Young’s ‘five faces of oppression’ may Paris: Le Monde diplomatique. provide an alternate basis for the analysis I am Lefebvre, H. (1996 [1967]) ‘The Right to the City’, in E. Downloaded By: [Queen Mary & Westfield College] At: 18:01 24 September 2010 proposing. Kofman and E. Lebas (eds) Writings on Cities, 5 The point is discussed, and the difficulties shown, in pp. 63–184. London: Blackwell. many of the contributions to Marcuse (forthcoming). Lui, M. (2009) ‘The wealth gap gets wider’, The 6 Marcuse (2007). In a further elaboration, I am Washington Post, 23 March. suggesting disaggregating the three steps into six: Marcuse, H. (1955) Eros and Civilization. Boston: Reflect (to clarify whose values and the planners’ Beacon Press. own role), Theorize (to understand the roots of the Marcuse, H. (1969) An Essay on Liberation. Boston: problem, whose immediate form and concrete Beacon Press. actors should then lead to the next step), Expose Marcuse, P. (1989) ‘“Dual City”: a muddy metaphor for (to communicate clearly the realities underlying the a quartered city’, International Journal of Urban problem, the parties and interests involved), and Regional Research 13(4), pp. 697–708. Propose (to put concrete proposals forward for Marcuse, P. (2007) ‘Social justice in New Orleans: action), Disclose (to make clear the assumptions planning after Katrina’, Progressive Planning, involved, and the limits of what can be expected), Summer, pp. 8–12. and Politicize (to deal with issues of strategy and Marcuse, P. (2008) ‘In defense of the ’60’s’, In These tactics involved in implementation). Times 32(8), pp. 33–35.