w1/urban

I’ve divided Harvey’s text into six sections, following his own outline in the essay. Note: this essay is also a great example of a tightly organized paper. As you can see from my outline, each section has a clear organization and central argument, often with examples to support his points.

SECTION ONE, ARGUMENT: The right to shape our cities is an important but most neglected human right. The right to the city is held in the hands of private interests, and is developed for those with purchasing power.

•Harvey bases his analysis on capitalism’s need to create surplus product in order to produce surplus value. That value is then reinvested in order to produce more surplus value. 24

•This process benefits those who profit from the selling of surplus product. This is a class system because the control over the disbursement of surpluses lies in only a few hands. 24

•This is the general situation in all areas of capitalism. But urbanization plays an active role (along with military spending), “in absorbing surplus product that capitalists perpetually produce in search for profits.” 25

SURPLUS

•Surplus value: That which is over and above what is required for the producers to live.

•Surplus value is produced by workers, but they are only given wages for a small percentage of the value of what they produce (i.e. wage is smaller than the real value of the product the worker creates).

•The owner of the corporation and their investors profit from the surplus value, not the people who actually create the surplus.

•Role of labor system in producing surplus:

•To extract more surplus value, an owner will reduce wages. They do this through layoffs, outsourcing, replacement with technology, getting rid of unions, cheaper immigrant labor, extending working day, etc.

•Only labor that is “productive”—i.e. that produces surplus value/capital, is supported under capitalism. (i.e. consider what labor is not supported under capitalism—i.e. what types of work are devalued?)

Surplus labor: the labor extended beyond what is needed to produce the products needed to survive. This surplus labor is often unpaid.

Surplus product: The excess product produced.

•If you have surplus product, you need to find a way to sell it (have it absorbed) to make a profit. Hence, there is a perpetual need to find a place for surplus product “absorption.”

•To do this, capitalists must find new “markets” or create new markets (for example, convince us we need a new smart phone every year). If not enough people to buy things in one market then capitalists will:

•expand foreign trade

•promote new products/lifestyles—in your market or abroad

•create new opportunities for credit

•engage in debt-financing (for example, push you to get another credit card!)

•Must use more resources—which means finding new places to get raw materials (rain forest clearance, etc.) and absorb waste (landfills).

•This is often the focus of colonial endeavors (find new places to get raw materials and dump our trash) and is something that’s impacting environmental degradation, hence the rise of the environmentalist movement.

SECTION TWO, EXAMPLE 1: Using reinvestment of surplus product in urbanization as a means of stemming urban revolutions that result from reduction in labor (i.e. unemployment) and for creating markets for surplus product (if there is lots of unemployed labor, then there are less people to buy surplus product. This is why whenever there is a recession those in power ask you to spend spend spend!).

Ok, so what’s going on in France in 1848? What’s the situation? (25)

•Louis Napoleon/Haussmann/Paris 1848-1880s:

•Violent suppression of demonstration against Napoleon III’s regime

•Infrastructural investment through debt-financed infrastructural urban projects

•This led to the transformation city and created new urban identities/lifestyles (gentrification for bourgeoisie): cafes, boutiques, fashion industry, expositions.

•Overextended speculative system and credit—which led to an economic crash.

•Those not included in process were displaced. This eventually led to a revolt—this was at heart of the Paris Commune.

•Harvey says that citizens fought to take back part of the city after they displaced through gentrification.

•U.S. Post-WWII suburbanization and urban renewal

•Maintain military industrial complex

•Debt-financed suburban development and home ownership

•Home ownership:

•We are less likely to strike/reject system because in we’re in debt.

•We turn our focus to the defense of property values and “individualized identities” instead of citizenship.

•There is less investment in the inner city. Capitalists create new markets by tearing down and rebuilding (in manner that makes city palpable to suburbanites who will buy surplus products in cities).

•Those not included in this process:

•Inner city working class residents, especially African Americans

•White suburban young adults, many in universities (1960s protests)

•In the 1960s and 70s, these groups protest in the space of the city for equal access to the space of the city.

SECTION THREE, EXAMPLE 2: Current examples: Chronic inability to absorb surplus capital stabilized through debt-financed housing industry and other construction. 29

•Housing sector used to stabilize economy because absorbs surplus capital through construction.

•Housing = more purchasing of domestic goods

•Housing = feel like have ownership in this system. Also, we’ll be too tied to house debt to voice concerns in an organized fashion.

•This phenomenon is global, and we are all tied to it through foreign investment. Risk is spread as capitalism spreads.

•China, Korea, Mumbai, Dubai, etc.

•Process basically the same as mid-19th century:

•Look for new markets to invest surplus value

•construction new financial institutions to make happen

•Credit system to sustain it

•Harvey predicts the Great Recession!

SECTION FOUR, PROPERTY = PACIFICATION: This method of urbanization includes lifestyle changes. This leads to pacification of victims of process of privitization. 31

QUESTIONS FOR CLASS: Do you have freedom of choice in L.A.? How do you identify freedom? Is this a collective freedom or a personal freedom? What’s the difference?

•Aura of freedom of choice—if you have the money

•Urban life is a commodity, pacified by consumption of culture but mostly shopping (“pacification by cappuccino”—Sharon Zukin)

•Ideology of individualism instead of political life = freedom is linked to property values, not political debate

•People are divided by class and race in space of city. Wealthy have more control over space of city.

•Gated communities, home-owner associations more about fragmentation/fascisms (Mike Davis)

•This makes it hard to have collective urban identity, citizenship and belonging. 32

SECTION FIVE, GENTRIFICATION AND URBAN “RENEWAL”: Creative destruction is the most violent form of surplus absorption.

•Destroy current “slum” areas to create opportunity for reinvesting surplus value. 33

•This main project of 60s, 70s in inner cities—tower in the park developments across U.S., Latin America, and Europe

•Destruction only hurts poor/disenfranchised—no investment in areas or largely displaced by new developments for those with means.

•Communities broken up, low income residents displaced, face longer commutes to jobs, means need to pay more for car/fuel, contributes to poor environmental air quality.

•This shows that not everyone has equal rights to the city

•Reaction by these groups held back by police power

•Can lead to uprisings

SECTION SIX, FIGHTING BACK: 37

•WANT: greater democratic control over the production and utilization of the surplus 37

•Why is no one fighting? Where is our Paris Commune?

•Complex because urban process is global.

•But yet signs of rebellion everywhere: Egypt’s Arab Spring, Occupy Movement, Black Lives Matter, Chilean student protests about profit in education, protests in Argentina, walk outs and protests over women’s rights, sunflower student movement protests in Taiwan, and Hong Kong’s Umbrella Movement, but hard to coordinate.

•Could expand though!

•Revolution must be urban

1. Capitalists = constantly need to reinvest surplus product to be profitable

2. This leads to urban expansion (city building around sites production)

3. Production = housing, factories, shopping, etc.

4. Workers paid not $ but wages, which give back to capitalists when buy their products

a. Reproduce by keeping people working

b. Must produce more than need to use up surplus and make capital

c. This is constant reproduction

1. Housing debt financing p. 29

2. Now global p. 29

3. P. 32 Division of class seen in cities—gated communities, privatized spaces under surveillance (mall), etc.

4. P. 33 Most violent form of surplus absorption is thro destruction and recreation = gentrification

5. Signs of rebellion p. 37 but global so not coordinated. Lefebvre say revolution has to be urban

6. Right to City in hand of private interests, (Bloomberg creates city for developers)

David Harvey

“The Right to the City”

Prof. Emily Bills

In-class assignment

Please respond to the following discussion questions, using my notes on Harvey’s essay as a supplementary guide when needed. You should rely first and foremost on his essay but my notes are there to assist you with the more difficult concepts and to provide a basic outline of his ideas.

1. What is the main point of the first page of the essay? What argument is Harvey laying out about “the right to the city?”

2. What were some motivations behind urban renewal projects in Paris under Haussmann/Napoleon II and in New York under Robert Moses? (You can refer to the film on New York and Robert Moses if helpful.)

3. What role did urban displacement play in these projects according to Harvey? Per our conversation about the Neil Smith and Sharon Zukin texts, do you think gentrification plays a part in this?

4. What kind of response did these projects elicit? From whom? Consider the Paris Commune, the uprisings and protests of 1968, and Jane Jacobs’ protests.

5. Doing research online, make a connection between Harvey’s comments about “the right to the city” and the revolution needing to take place in the city and the Occupy Movement.

Due: Your written response to these questions is due by Sunday. We can review the questions/responses in class next Wednesday when I’m better able to contribute to discussion.

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