SSU#1. New Municipalism and Infrastructures of Urban Welfare

The multiple crises of our time are coming to a head in dramatic manner: Following the financial crises triggered in 2008, social disparities widened by austerity policies, concentration of wealth and climate crisis, most recently the pandemic and the new geopolitics have heightened the challenges. While the causes of these dynamics may be global, their social consequences manifest locally. Since the 2010s the impacts of urban austerity have burdened the public purse at municipal level in particular, with grave consequences for welfare provision and urban infrastructures. At the same time, a number of “rebel cities” (David Harvey) have emerged as sites of resistance that became known as the New Municipalism. New municipalists do not only center on redistribution and public infrastructures but also on instituting democratic practices to gain collective control over key aspects of everyday life. The presentation is based on four years of empirical research in Barcelona, which is regarded as a beacon of municipalist politics. The key question is as to whether the new city governement succeeded to implement new modes of ownership and collective management in infrastructure policy. Particular attention will be paid to the hurdles and obstacles and the question of where community-based initiatives run the risk of undermining social rights instead of democratising them. To put it bluntly: Do we witness new forms of urban collective ownership or rather the extreme mutability of community capitalism?