Political Strategies and Tactics for Transformative Urban Change

Public lecture hosted by LSE Cities

As attention in urban development is shifting from the ‘what’ of interventions and desired outcomes to the ‘how’ of facilitating urban change, this event explored contemporary experiences in urban policy and design tactics.

It acknowledged that tactical questions such as appropriate timing, communicating key benefits, navigating stakeholders and making use of demonstration projects and experimentation have become a key area of urban leadership and governance innovation.

This public lecture and debate contrasted experiences with urban tactics linked to social urbanism and transport policy cutting across a range of innovative cities including Medellin, Mexico City, Vienna and Stockholm.

Image: 2018 Medellín Línea H del Metrocable entre estaciones
Las Torres y Villa Sierra by Felipe Restrepo Acosta

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Profiles

    Diane E Davis

    Diane E Davis is the Charles Dyer Norton Professor of Regional Planning and Urbanism and Chair of the Department of Urban Planning and Design at the Graduate School of Design, Harvard University. Trained as a sociologist, Davis’s research interests include the relations between urbanization and national development, comparative urban governance, socio-spatial practice in conflict cities, urban violence, and new territorial manifestations of sovereignty. Before to moving to the GSD in 2011, Davis served as the head of the International Development Group in the Department of Urban Studies and Planning at MIT, where she also had a term as Associate Dean of the School of Architecture and Planning.

    Alejandro Echeverri

    Alejandro Echeverri is an architect and planner from Medellín, Colombia; cofounder and director of URBAM, the Center for Urban and Environmental Studies at EAFIT University; and formerly the Director of Urban Projects at the Municipality of Medellín, 2005-2008. He earned the National Architectural Award in 1996, the National Urban Planning Award in 2008, the Curry Stone Design Prize in 2009, the 10 Veronica Rudge Green Prize in Urban Design from Harvard, among others.

    Philipp Rode

    Philipp Rode is Executive Director of LSE Cities and Associate Professorial Research Fellow at the London School of Economics and Political Science. As researcher, consultant and advisor he has been directing interdisciplinary projects comprising urban governance, transport, city planning and urban design at the LSE since 2003. The focus of his current work is on institutional structures and governance capacities of cities, and on sustainable urban development, transport and mobility. Rode is co-directing the cities workstream of the Global Commission on the Economy and Climate and has co-led the United Nations Habitat III Policy Unit on Urban Governance. He is a Member of the Board of Directors of the Institute for Transportation and Development Policy (ITDP).