Socialist cities have special qualities which endure in particular, subtle, and often under-theorized ways. This book engages with socialism on a global scale, as well as the variety of socialist urbanisms and post-socialist urbanisms, and the range of ways in which globalization intersects with changes in socialist and post-socialist cities.

Offering a unique international comparative focus, the book’s fourteen case studies from Asia, Europe, Latin America, and Africa are grouped under three main themes: housing experiences and life trajectories, planning and architecture, and governance and social order. Featuring contributors from a range of disciplinary backgrounds and research foci, Socialist and Post-Socialist Urbanisms brings together a collection of essays on cities that are often overlooked in mainstream urban studies.

Prizes

Winner of International Planning History Society Book Prize 2022 - Third Prize 2022 (United States)

"What this volume does at its best is break the unifying banner of socialist modernity by uncovering how socialist and post-socialist modes of dwelling, planning, and governing unfold through everyday experiences, where "deeply rooted codes rather than formal rules" prevail. And it is exactly that balance between the global reach and at the same time local stories that one should be eager to discover when starting this exciting journey into socialist and post-socialist urbanisms."

"Socialist urban legacies are an integral and vital part of the modern world, without which it would look different. Furthermore, these legacies are still in effect and reveal their traces in various spheres, sometimes the most unexpected ones. The authors’ efforts to analyse those influences ‘from around the socialist world’ (p. 3) is thus meaningful, timely, and promising."

"This book contributes original research on socialist and post-socialist urbanisms, which is necessary for anyone who strives to understand how past decisions still and very much influence present production of space and of spatial imaginations, within either a socialist or post-socialist context."

Lisa B.W. Drummond is an associate professor in the Urban Studies Program In the Department of Social Science at York University.

Douglas Young is an associate professor in the Urban Studies Program in the Department of Social Science at York University.