Entrepreneurial City Research Articles

Glurbanization of the Chinese megacity Guangzhou – image-building and city development through entrepreneurial governance

Abstract. The continuing integration of the Chinese economy into the globalizing world and increasing intercity competition have had significant and comparatively recent implications for post-socialist urbanization in China. Driven by market-oriented development and globalization, decentralization of economic decision-making and downscaling of governance from the central state to local governments and authorities characterize the changing role of the state from urban managerialism to urban entrepreneurialism. Drawing on Jessop's definition of the entrepreneurial city and his concept of glurbanization, this paper aims to identify and analyse different modes of entrepreneurial urban governance based on the example of Guangzhou, a Chinese megacity that has been under intense pressure to revitalize its leading role as an economic, commercial and cultural centre in the Pearl River Delta and the rest of southern China. To face globalization and promote competitiveness, Guangzhou pursues various innovative interscalar entrepreneurial strategies in an active entrepreneurial fashion through adopting an entrepreneurial discourse. This is critically reflected upon within this article.

Mega-Retail-Led Regeneration and Housing Price

With the ongoing shift in the dynamics of retail development toward inner-city sites, mega-retail-led regeneration schemes have emerged as an important strategy for place marketing in the entrepreneurial city of London. While a number of studies have attempted to examine the effects of these schemes, the focus of previous studies has been limited to their wider economic and environmental effects. However, few studies have empirically investigated their impact on surrounding neighborhoods, particularly deprived neighborhoods. This paper investigates the effects of the Westfield London Shopping Centre on changes in housing price levels in the surrounding neighborhood of White City/Shepherd's Bush, in order to determine whether mega-retail-led regeneration schemes are a key determinant in the process of gentrification. A difference-in-differences analysis was used to assess differentials in the change rates of housing prices between control and treatment groups following the development of Westfield London. It was found that Westfield London development caused an increase in the change rate of housing prices of the treatment group relative to that of the control group. These findings indicate that mega-retail-led regeneration schemes may be a main cause of the pricing out of neighborhood residents who cannot afford the resulting increased rents and for altering the characteristics of neighborhoods and their social networks.

Policy Boosterism, Policy Mobilities, and the Extrospective City

This study develops the notion of “policy boosterism,” a subset of traditional branding and marketing activities that involves the active promotion of locally developed and/or locally successful policies, programs, or practices across wider geographical fields as well as to broader communities of interested peers. It is argued that policy boosterism is (1) an important element of how urban policy actors engage with global communities of professional peers and with local residents, and (2) a useful concept with which to interrogate and understand how policies and policy knowledge are mobilized among cities. A conceptualization of policy boosterism and its role in global-urban policymaking is developed by combining insights from the burgeoning “policy mobilities” literature with those of the longstanding literature on entrepreneurial city marketing. It is supported by illustrative examples of policy boosterism in Vancouver: the city's Greenest City and Green Capital initiatives, the use of the term “Vancouverism” among the city's urban design community, and demonstrations of new urban technologies during the 2010 Winter Olympics that were used to market a particular vision of the city's governance to people from elsewhere, but also—crucially—to local audiences. The article concludes by highlighting four foci that might frame future work at the intersections of policy boosterism and policy mobilities.

Business Improvement Districts in Germany – Contextualization of a “mobile policy”

The introduction of Business Improvement Districts (BID) in Germany can be seen as an exemplary case of a ‚mobile policy’. As modes of governance that are being implemented throughout multiple national and international contexts, mobile policies offer prime examples for the ways in which urban policies are increasingly produced by translocal networks. BIDs promise to bring private capital and civic commitment to inner cities and to help them compete with suburban shopping centers. In the first part of this article we focus on the question of whether BIDs can be regarded as paradigmatic for new modes of governance in the ‚entrepreneurial city’ and whether its globalization can shed light on more general processes of neoliberal urbanism. In the second part we deal with the scope and limits of theoretical approaches that try to understand the global proliferation of policy models. Using the framework of a policy mobilities approach in particular, we draw on case studies on BIDs in Germany.

Mega-events as a place marketing strategy in entrepreneurial cities: İzmir's EXPO 2015 candidacy as a roadmap for hosting EXPO 2020

One of the most popular place marketing strategies for regional development and the promotion of stakeholder collaboration is the use of mega-events. This study investigates how mega-events as an entrepreneurial governance tool have been used. The paper examines the legacy of the failed application for Izmir to host the 2015 EXPO from a stakeholder organisational perspective. The impact of the bidding process on the governance of Izmir is evaluated primarily through stakeholder interviews using four indicators of effective collaboration: commitment, mediation, representativeness and networks. The conclusion highlights the importance of the collaborative approach for stakeholder organisational structure and resilience as critical in building an entrepreneurial city even when the city did not succeed in bidding for this mega-event.

Aporia of Participatory Planning: Framing Local Action in the Entrepreneurial City

This essay examines the hegemonic-discursive barriers facing local action in cities today, first, by revisiting the New Left/Frankfurt School critique of modern institutions, which not incidentally proved a key inspirational source for the original grassroots movements of the 1960s and 1970s. In this first section of the essay, Adorno's analysis of the Culture Industry is reconsidered alongside Berger’s and Bourdieu's critical sociology. Second, it is argued that the institutional recuperation of localism since the 1970s has resulted in a paradoxical abandoning or overturning of its earlier revolutionary-utopian motives, which has subsequently sowed the seeds for a new counterrevolutionary trend in local politics (so-called NIMBYism). This trend is seen as attendant to still larger city-transformative processes of gentrification and neoliberalisation, or ‘urban entrepreneurialism.’ The essay concludes, finally, with an exposition of the central challenges at hand, and presents an alternative envisioning of participation as a mode of nonintegrative or counterhegemonic praxis.

Urban Policy Mobility Studies and the Entrepreneurial City: Contextualizing BID and PPP as Globalized Policy Models in Frankfurt, Main

Urban Policy Mobility Studies and the Entrepreneurial City: Contextualizing BID and PPP as Globalized Policy Models in Frankfurt, Main

The Socio-Economic Trajectories of Migrant Street Vendors in Urban South Africa

This study investigated the means used by immigrants for their insertion into the economic landscape of the entrepreneurial cities of their host countries using street vendors in Cape Town as a case study. The concept of social network was central in the explanation of the mechanism of immigrant insertion in the entrepreneurial city. It helped to explain some of the strategies used by immigrants for their insertion into the market space of urban areas in the destination country. The study was based on a survey of two hundred and eight (208) immigrant vendors from other African countries in five suburbs of Cape Town. The study adapted a mix research approach in which a survey questionnaire, focus group discussions, personal interviews, and observation were utilised to collect and analyse the data. The results of the analysis showed that nationality underpinned by social networks was a major factor in the socio-economic trajectories of immigrants in urban South Africa. DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2013.v4n2p109

Aporia of Participatory Planning: Framing Local Action in the Entrepreneurial City

This essay examines the hegemonic-discursive barriers facing local action in cities today, first, by revisiting the New Left/Frankfurt School critique of modern institutions, which not incidentally proved a key inspirational source for the original grassroots movements of the 1960s and 1970s. In this first section of the essay, Adorno's analysis of the Culture Industry is reconsidered alongside Berger’s and Bourdieu's critical sociology. Second, it is argued that the institutional recuperation of localism since the 1970s has resulted in a paradoxical abandoning or overturning of its earlier revolutionary-utopian motives, which has subsequently sowed the seeds for a new counterrevolutionary trend in local politics (so-called NIMBYism). This trend is seen as attendant to still larger city-transformative processes of gentrification and neoliberalisation, or ‘urban entrepreneurialism.’ The essay concludes, finally, with an exposition of the central challenges at hand, and presents an alternative envisioning of participation as a mode of nonintegrative or counterhegemonic praxis.

Variations of the Entrepreneurial City: Goals, roles and visions in Rotterdam's Kop van Zuid and the Glasgow Harbour Megaprojects

AbstractBoth Rotterdam's Kop van Zuid and the Glasgow Harbour waterfront developments are examples of different forms of European urban entrepreneurial megaprojects. They are both situated on formerly vacant land in older industrial cities. In Rotterdam, the municipality has taken the initiative in planning and developing the megaproject, while in Glasgow, this task has been left to the private sector, with the City functioning as a facilitator. While urban entrepreneurialism and megaprojects have been discussed in academic literature for almost three decades, there are too few case studies which delve into the specific visions guiding these projects, the goals which they are meant to achieve and the positions which different actors play. The aim of this article is to analyze the relationship between these visions, goals and positions of actors in megaprojects and whether these relationships can explain how the different outcomes are produced. What we see is that in municipally‐led projects, entrepreneurial goals are more easily formed and implemented than when the public sector acts only as a facilitator to private developers. It will also argue that it is not only structural contexts which are important in determining the types of megaprojects which get built and the success which they achieve, but also the specific values, visions and goals that different stakeholders have.

EVALUATING THE EUROPEAN SMART CITIES VISIONS OF THE FUTURE

This paper illustrates a novel application of an Analytic Network Process (ANP) in the field of Smart cities with the aim of investigating the interrelations between the components and sectors of Smart cities. Although there is no agreement on the exact definition of a Smart city, a number of main dimensions can be identified through literature review and these include: smart economy, smart mobility, smart environment, smart people, smart living, and smart governance. These six dimensions are used to evaluate four different policy visions of the city of the future as derived from the Joint Programme Initiatives “Urban Europe” (JPI-EU). The results of the evaluation show that the Entrepreneurial City is the policy vision with higher priorities in all the sectors considered in the model, i.e. Universities, Government, Industry and Civil Society. Some relevant urban planning and policy implications of this vision are provided in the conclusion. http://dx.doi.org/10.13033/ijahp.v4i1.108

Innovation and Entrepreneurship in Cities: Unlocking Future Local Economic Growth and Fiscal Capacity

As cities face increasing global competition and fiscal constraints in the post-recession economy, many city leaders wonder from what source future growth will emerge. One answer to this question is innovation. Cities that create a culture of innovation and entrepreneurship will be better positioned for economic recovery, job creation, greater resiliency, and the potential for regional economic transformation. The paper explores the role of local government policy in cultivating and fostering an innovation and entrepreneurship ecosystem. In particular, it focuses on local economic development and fiscal policies that can create and foster this ecosystem.

Ganging up in the entrepreneurial city: Melbourne, the casino and the Underbelly franchise

ABSTRACTUnderbelly (2008), Screentime's $10.4 million, thirteen-part dramatization of the so-called ‘Gangland Wars’ from 1995 to 2004, tracing the rise and fall of career criminal Carl Williams, showcases a Melbourne largely unseen on the screen. That so much of Underbelly is shot on location means that its sets are the real spaces and places of Melbourne, overlaid with the scripted drama of what may have occurred there. This provides a new way of mapping the city, crime by crime, over time, a new way of understanding the Melbourne that the Kennett Government remade throughout the 1990s as an ‘entrepreneurial city’. It is our argument that it is this ‘entrepreneurial’ Melbourne that is being re-presented in Underbelly. Kennett's entrepreneurial city is the context in which Williams operates and the philosophy to which he ascribes during his takeover of Melbourne's drug trade. Drawing on examples from the 2008 Underbelly series, newspaper reports, Silvester and Rule's 2008 repackaging of their underworld reports and a mixture of neo-liberal and entrepreneurial theory, this article explores Melbourne's construction as an entrepreneurial city and how this has been represented, repackaged and experienced in a way Kennett himself could never have foreseen, through the Underbelly television series and the new markets this has opened.

Local, glocal, entrepreneurial and socio-ecological aspects of the contemporary city

This paper, using political science and sociological approach, points to a series of phenomena, processes and problems related to the decentralization of state government, local government, glocal world, entrepreneurial city and urban socio-ecological features in the context of globalization, post-socialist transformation and ecological modernization. It is primarily about the way of managing the city, about urban policy. The power is the central category of each policy, including the local politics - power, social actors and interests in connection with them. Urban processes are governed by different actors - politicians, businessmen, experts, citizens / consumers, NGOs - some of which actually run, while others are subordinated, or resist, which indicates the latent and manifest tensions and conflicts in urban areas. Therefore, the concluding part of the paper points to the phenomenon of entrepreneurial city and its actors involved in the game of power. In order to concretize, some results of recent (2010) socio-ecological research of attitudes of representatives of local government in Serbia are used. Whether and how much a democratic decision-making in urban politics takes place is also one of the questions that are attended to.

State Rescaling, Contested Space, and Inequality in the Globalizing City-regions of China: Conceptual Issues and Empirical Evidence

In post-reform China, the spatial forms of cities are defined by two combined forces—a downward decentralization of responsibility for economic development, and an upward centralization of power to larger urban cores. This process of administrative rescaling is creating an “entrepreneurial urban space” in the city cores and “commercialized towns and villages” in the city margins (McGee et al. 2007). As a result of the rescaling, a form of contested space has emerged, mostly in cities and their immediate margins, where local civil society is constantly resisting or adapting to the Chinese urban expansion manifested through territorial reorganization and boundary redefinition. Cities’ inner margins (suburbs) have in particular seen the most dramatic increases in population and manufacturing due to migration, housing development, and industrial relocation. This paper seeks to provide a close dissection of the process of rescaling and the production of these contested urban spaces through a spatial lens. In adopting a comparative and case study approach, this paper analyzes census data from three large city-regions in China: Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou to explore two questions: (1) whether this rescaling is creating segmentation, displacement, or polarization in residence and work spaces; and (2) at which scales (district or community) these spatial outcomes are unfolding. The paper concludes that inequalities are increasingly concentrated in the inner margins, where an entrepreneurial city core meets the self-initiated urban expansion of the towns in the outer margins, and farmers, displaced urbanites, rural migrants, and foreign workers aggregate and compete for space.

Neoliberal Urbanization and Projects of Entrepreneurial City

Neoliberal Urbanization and Projects of Entrepreneurial City

Urban design, regeneration and the entrepreneurial city

This paper explores whether and how forms of entrepreneurial governance effecting deprived regions of the UK have embraced urban design as a necessary and distinctive feature of regeneration efforts. It applies established theory and thinking to work completed in the city centre of Liverpool since the late 1990s. The article examines the economic and governance context through which new forms of urban design policy and guidance have emerged, and discusses whether and how they have been applied to developments emerging across the centre. The case has embraced an urban design agenda and this can firmly be attributed to entrepreneurial forms of governance, although the attributes of the built form sometimes credited to such places were not so evident. Principles embedded in policy and guidance have dovetailed with substantive thinking within urban design and can be recognised in significant projects. Whilst there should be a concern for the privatisation of the public realm generally, issues such as gentrification and a more general concern for placelessness are overstated. Iconic forms of development have not materialised. Forms of over development, such as tall buildings, have been moderated by policy and guidance. Large scale projects can be designed to fit into and enhance the fabric of the city when urban design thinking is clearly embraced by partners. Established critiques of the relationship between urban design and entrepreneurial forms of governance have not always explored the multiple meanings and discourses that the built environment can contain, but where urban design is concerned the discussion must at least embrace the criteria urban designers themselves employ to design schemes or judge the results.

‘Creative Industry Clusters’ and the ‘Entrepreneurial City’ of Shanghai

This article evaluates the impact of ‘creative industry clusters’ on urban entrepreneurialism in Shanghai. It aims to introduce the concept of ‘creative industry clusters’ into the discussion of the ‘entrepreneurial city’ in China by testing two main arguments regarding the role of creative industry clusters, and to develop the concept of entrepreneurial city in China. The major argument is that, although these clusters are playing an important role in upgrading the city’s entrepreneurial features particularly in attracting business, they have made a limited contribution to fostering talent or boosting creative industry entrepreneurship. Three features of the entrepreneurial city of Shanghai are: the government’s stance of attracting capital and professionals; the continuation of urban commodification in character; and, the innovativeness of diversified forms of urban commodities within current urban policies. Such new forms of commodities, however, do not serve as new strategies designed specifically for creative industries.

The Evolution of Housing Renewal in Shanghai, 1990–2010: A ‘Socially Conscious’ Entrepreneurial City?

Adopting a dynamic conception of the ‘entrepreneurial city’, this paper analyses the evolving policies and practice of housing renewal in Shanghai between 1990 and 2010. It demonstrates that compared to the 1990s, a more sophisticated and ‘socially conscious’ renewal framework has evolved over the last decade, incorporating heightened attention to heritage conservation, rehabilitation, to affordable housing provision and to ameliorating the social costs of displacement. Arguably, the role of government in housing renewal has become more sophisticated. Alongside its continued role as market facilitator and place-promoter, local government has developed a more extensive role in market regulation and as a mediator of competing social interests in urban renewal. On the one hand, the quest to foster an international city necessitates attention a more comprehensive set of urban agendas. On the other hand, these changes also reflect the emergence of a national agenda calling for more socio-economically ‘balanced development’, as rising inequality and citizen discontent demanded more nuanced urban policies.

Bargaining for Brooklyn: Community Organizations in the Entrepreneurial City. By Nicole P. Marwell. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2007. 288p. $55.00 cloth, $22.00 paper.

Bargaining for Brooklyn: Community Organizations in the Entrepreneurial City. By Nicole P. Marwell. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2007. 288p. $55.00 cloth, $22.00 paper.