Creighton Connolly

Emerging infectious disease outbreaks have transformed the very nature of urban life worldwide, even as the extent and experience of pandemics are shaped by the planetary urban condition. Pandemic Urbanism critically investigates these relationships in a world faced with its first pandemic on a majority urban planet. The authors reveal the social and historical context of recent infectious disease events and how they have variously transformed the urban fabric. They highlight the important role played by socio-ecological processes associated with the global urban periphery – suburban or post-suburban zones and hinterland areas of “extended” urbanization – changing mobility patterns, and new forms of urban governance and pandemic response. The book develops novel insights for post-pandemic urban governance and planning grounded in the quest for social and spatial justice. In doing so, it reveals a paradox at the heart of pandemic urbanism: urban life enables contagion to spread easily, yet at the same time offers unique possibilities to contain and respond to disease outbreaks. Multidisciplinary in approach and written by experts in the field, this book is an invaluable primer on the origins, pathways, and management of infectious disease.

Emerging infectious disease outbreaks have transformed the very nature of urban life worldwide, even as the extent and experience of pandemics are shaped by the planetary urban condition. Pandemic Urbanism critically investigates these relationships in a world faced with its first pandemic on a majority urban planet. The authors reveal the social and historical context of recent infectious disease events and how they have variously transformed the urban fabric. They highlight the important role played by socio-ecological processes associated with the global urban periphery – suburban or post-suburban zones and hinterland areas of “extended” urbanization – changing mobility patterns, and new forms of urban governance and pandemic response. The book develops novel insights for post-pandemic urban governance and planning grounded in the quest for social and spatial justice. In doing so, it reveals a paradox at the heart of pandemic urbanism: urban life enables contagion to spread easily, yet at the same time offers unique possibilities to contain and respond to disease outbreaks. Multidisciplinary in approach and written by experts in the field, this book is an invaluable primer on the origins, pathways, and management of infectious disease.

Connolly uses ongoing urban redevelopment in Penang in Malaysia to provide stimulating new perspectives on urbanisation, governance and political ecology. The book deploys the concept of landscape political ecology to show how Penang residents, activists, planners and other stakeholders mobilize new relationships with the urban environment, to contest controversial development projects and challenge hegemonic visions for the city’s future. Based on six years of local research, this book provides both a dynamic account of region’s rapid reshaping and a fresh theoretical framework in which to consider issues of sustainable development, heritage and governance in urban areas worldwide.