This course invites participants to engage in critical and creative thinking about urban spaces, viewing cities not merely as a site of crisis and capital accumulation but as a space of transformation and liberation. Through a collaborative exploration of global case studies, we will examine how communities are actively reclaiming urban life through concepts of commons, care, decolonial practices, and resistance. Grounded in transformative theory, each section of the course will provide tools and frameworks to envision and enact a more equitable urban future.
The course was designed by Mabrouka M’barek as part of the Beyond Development Working Group Collective.
Curriculum
- 10 Sections
- 40 Lessons
- 10 Weeks
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- Section 0: Welcome and how the course works3
- Section 1: The Urban Question – Cities, Capitalism, and the Right to the City: Framing the City as Terrain of Struggle and Liberation7
- 2.1Module 0: Introduction
- 2.2Module 1: What is the Urban Question? Cities, Capitalism, and the Global Architecture of Power
- 2.3Module 2: Accelerated Imperialist Wars and the Crisis of Global Capitalism
- 2.4Module 3: Right to the City – Theory and Praxis
- 2.5Module 4: Occupy and the Reclaiming of Urban Space: From Protest to Possibility: The Urban as a Space of Struggle and Transformation
- 2.6Module 5: Reflecting on Your City
- 2.7Quiz: Section 15 Questions
- Section 2: Urban Commons – Reclaiming Land, Space, and Infrastructure, Municipalism in Practice6
- Section 3: Everyday Economies – Markets, Currencies, and Social Reproduction6
- 4.1Module 0: Introduction
- 4.2Module 1: Community Currencies and Economic Autonomy in Kenya
- 4.3Module 2: Informal Markets and Resistance in San Roque, Ecuador
- 4.4Module 3: Migrant Streets, Collective Power – Top Manta and the Urban economy of Barcelona
- 4.5Module4: Social Reproduction and Feminist Economies
- 4.6Quiz: Section 35 Questions
- Section 4: Reclaiming Territory – Urban Resistance, Anti-Racism, Care, and Collective Life5
- Section 5: Coloniality and the Postcolonial City5
- 6.1Module 0: Introduction
- 6.2Module 1: Theorizing the Colonial City: For whom is the city a border?
- 6.3Module 2 Margins of the Metropolis: Colonial Urbanism and the Struggle for Place in Makoko
- 6.4Module 3 Unmaking Empire, Remaking the City – Reflecting on Decolonial Urbanism Where You Are
- 6.5Quiz: Section 55 Questions
- Section 6: Decolonial and Liberation Urbanism – Black Radical Approaches on Turtle Island (United States)5
- Section 7: Crisis and Rupture – COVID-19, Climate, War and the Urban Future5
- Section 8: Building the Urban Future – Municipalism and Translocal Solidarity5
- Course Recap1
