Pile, Steve, Keith, Michael, Murji, Karim ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7490-7906 and Solomos, John (2023) Politicization, postpolitics and the open city: Openness, closedness and the spatialisation of the political. Society and Space, 41 (6). pp. 1075-1093. ISSN 0263-7758

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Abstract

The idea of the open city has been used both conceptually and analytically to understand the
politics of the city. The contrast between the open city and the closed city relies, in part, upon an
understanding of the global systems that enfold cities and, consequently, the politics that are –
and are not – afforded cities. Notions such as the postpolitical city depend not on temporality
where the city has ceased to be political, but a spatialisation of politics where the (properly)
political has become excluded by the closed systems that envelope cities. In this paper, we
explore analytical and theoretical responses to the horror of the Grenfell Tower fire to disclose
the ways that different critiques of neoliberalism and racial capitalism deploy and rely upon
different conceptions of the open and closed systems of the city. Rather than settle for the open/closed binary, we seek to understand how different forms of openness and closedness
afford/constrain the politicisation (and depoliticization) of city life – and its catastrophes.

Item Type:	Article
Identifier:	10.1177/0263775823121779
Keywords:	Open city, politics of alterity, postpolitics, politicization, neoliberalism, Grenfell Tower
Subjects:	Social sciences
Depositing User:	Karim Murji
Date Deposited:	19 Feb 2024 15:03
Last Modified:	19 Feb 2024 15:03
URI:	https://repository.uwl.ac.uk/id/eprint/11214

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