Georg-Simmel Center for Urban Studies

Half-Life Cities: Capitalist Pasts & Socialist Futures

  • When Jan 20, 2020 from 06:00 to 08:00
  • Where Universitätsstraße 3b; 10117 Berlin; R002
  • Attendees Prof. Luděk Sýkora, Charles Univrsity Prague (Chair) Prof. Talja Blokland, Humboldt University
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Title: Half-Cities: Capitalist Pasts & Socialist Futures

Speaker: Prof. Luděk Sýkora, Charles Univrsity Prague

(Abstract below)

ENGLISH
The Think and Drink Series is presented by the Georg-Simmel-Center for Metropolitan Studies @ HU Berlin
-> on Mondays 6pm ct Room 002 (Ground Floor)
-> Universitätsstraße 3b / 10117 Berlin
-> Free & open to anyone interested in Urban Sociology, no prior registration needed
-> Talks and discussions take place in English language (with few exceptions)


More info:
https://www.sowi.hu-berlin.de/de/lehrbereiche/stadtsoz/think_drink

ABSTRACT

In 1990, Ralf Dahrendorf in his “Reflections on the revolution in Europe” envisaged that sixty years are barely enough to lay social foundations of new society. Three decades since the Great 1989 we are half-life through the anticipated change. Where we are now in 2019? This presentation argues that “Transformation” is not finished project yet. While the social practices of firms, households, and governments under the conditions of expanding neoliberal global capitalism brought former socialist countries and their cities into the global mainstream, the ever-present legacies of communism are deeply embodied in everyday urban life. Struggling through the second round of transition, the urban development paths are shaped by volatile equilibristic of discursive, policy and financial games. Critical reflections of three decades of post-socialist urban transformations help to illuminate alternative development perspectives on cities in Central and Eastern Europe.