On the entangled paths of urban resistance, city planning and heritage conservation

Abstract

Resistance, planning and conservation may seem like parallel or combating universes – while resistance almost always entails actions against the state institutions, planning and conservation practices function typically with and within them. These seemingly disen- gaged modalities of social and political processes came together as the focus of the 8th Annual AESOP Young Academics Conference, titled “Cities that Talks” that took place in Gothenburg, Sweden in 2014. The conference theme and an impressive array of case studies reflect the recent surge of urban resistance movements in Europe and elsewhere in the world. They also reflect a substantial level of interest among young academic scholars who, as a generation of young people, are themselves faced with social and political upheavals–including, but not limited to, the current impacts of neoliberal restructuring and austerity policies that percolate through the society today.