- Title
- Cities of possibility: performing care-full urban justice
- Creator
- Williams, Miriam Jean
- Relation
- University of Newcastle Research Higher Degree Thesis
- Resource Type
- thesis
- Date
- 2013
- Description
- Research Doctorate - Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
- Description
- Urban theory has a well-documented set of knowledges on actually existing injustice shaping cities in the here and now. Inspired by a politics of possibility, weak theory, theories of situated knowledges and an understanding of knowledge-making as performative, this research project reveals moments where people are doing/thinking/being cities differently by uncovering actually existing justice and care in three urban commons. Viewing the everyday as a potentially transformative site and understanding utopia as a ‘process-of-becoming’ (Swyngedouw and Kaika, 2003: 16) I read the city for possibility. By developing connections between urban justice-thinking and care-thinking I argue for a new way of approaching the possibility of the city—a concept I term care-full urban justice. This research documents actually existing forms of care-full urban justice manifest in three urban commons in Sydney, Australia: The Women’s Library, Newtown; Our Place Support Centre, Enmore; and Alfalfa House organic food cooperative, Enmore. Through engaging in an average of 15 months volunteering at each organisation, along with conducting 36 semi-structured interviews, I explore how these spaces are brought into being through everyday material practices and connections. I demonstrate that much is possible through connecting the grounded, everyday, relational, and radical focus of care-thinking with the rich history of justice-thinking in urban theory. The insights gained offer new ways of thinking through the role of urban commons and reveal how care-full urban justice might be used as a theory to uncover actually existing practices of care and justice in the here and now.
- Subject
- ethic of care; just city; urban commons; politics of possibility; care full urban justice
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/1959.13/1036117
- Identifier
- uon:13210
- Rights
- Copyright 2013 Miriam Jean Williams
- Language
- eng
- Full Text
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| Thumbnail | File | Description | Size | Format | |||
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| View Details Download | ATTACHMENT02 | Thesis | 2 MB | Adobe Acrobat PDF | View Details Download |