Cities and destroying ‘the other’

Abstract

The aim of this article is to show that cities are very often attacked because of their characteristic of ‘otherness’. ‘The other’ may be understood as other religion, other ethnicity, other culture, other political views or other people which is closely related to the idea of diversity, heterogeneity, pluralism and density as essential features of contemporary cities. The author examines theories explaining motives for destroying cities like the latter being a part of genocide or a distinct theory of urbicide. Finally the author proposes looking at the destruction of cities through the lens of destroying ‘the other’ and the possibility of a community. The research methods used include desk research and formal-legal analysis. Formal-legal analysis focuses on the jurisprudence of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia and the desk research on the relevant literature at the intersection of urban studies and international studies.