Eco-communities as insurgent climate urbanism: radical urban socio-material transformations

Abstract

ABSTRACT Eco-communities are permanent interventions to build and reshape the urban, aform of insurgent urbanism. Using examples from already-existing urban eco-communities the ways such projects demonstrate lasting material, social and economic transformations are illustrated through three examples of; generating affordability, designing for frequent social interaction, and repurposing marginalized public urban spaces. These examples are scalable to the city level, but would work best if replicated and reworked by neighborhoods, rather than taking one-size-fits-all approach to climate urbanism. However, for many eco-communities, there are often gaps between their imagined politics and their realization. Racial exclusion and class exclusivity, along with contradictions encountered in property ownership and affordability, require ongoing critical interrogation of seemingly radical versions of climate urbanism, lest they too contribute to the entrenchment rather than amelioration of inequalities in the contemporary urban.