Is another city possible? Towards an urbanised sustainability

Abstract

Sustainable development has proved to be a most compelling concept, generating enthusiasm across the political spectrum, endorsement from various sectors and industries, and high levels of support from certain individuals. As a corollary, one could argue that the city’s right to exist (Catterall, City 12(3), pp. 402–415, 2008) must now be articulated in terms of sustainability; indeed urban sustainability is an alluring goal for many cities. Unfortunately, the idea’s popularity has not necessarily led to appreciable benefits or improvements for the residents of urban areas, or for those (both human and non‐human) in areas from which cities draw their sustenance. There are even indications that the pursuit of urban sustainability may cause more problems than it solves. We argue that this is, in part, because the sustainable city is often treated as a site wherein particular policies, programmes and strategies may be enacted, with the ‘urban’ prefixed unreflectively to simplistic versions of the concept emphasising bio‐physical environmental goals. Such approaches neglect the city as a complex of social, economic, cultural and political concerns and, consequently, very little progress has been made in terms of synthesising these myriad and often conflicting aims. As an alternative, this paper explores the possibilities associated with treating the urban as a condition, and outlines some of the ways in which cityness contributes to an urbanised sustainability.