By Patrick Naef

Although the use of resilience in international relations and urban planning has given rise to a growing body of critical research, this contested concept continues to feature prominently in the conversation on the development of cities. Taking the 100 Resilient Cities (100RC) network pioneered by the Rockefeller Foundation as a case study, this article exposes some of the challenges inherent in the implementation of a global model of resilience. Exploring initiatives related to violence prevention in the member cities of Medellin, Cali (Colombia), Chicago (United States), and Belfast (Northern Ireland), this study will look at the practices of resilience officers, a position created by the 100RC network, and determine whether it can be considered as a new profession in the field of resilience planning. It will also use urban resilience to question the category of global cities, by suggesting that networks centered on resilience can serve as globalizing agents for “ordinary cities” (Robinson 2006). Finally, this article maintains that although the flexible and elusive definition promoted by 100RC facilitated a global circulation of the concept, its one-size-fits-all approach implied significant challenges and led in some cases to its depoliticization.

Annals of the American Association of Geographers 2022.

Edited ByVania Ceccato, Mahesh K. Nalla.

No city environment reflects the meaning of urban life better than a public place. A public place, whatever its nature—a park, a mall, a train platform or a street corner—is where people pass by, meet each other and at times become a victim of crime. With this book, we submit that crime and safety in public places are not issues that can be easily dealt with within the boundaries of a single discipline. The book aims to illustrate the complexity of patterns of crime and fear in public places with examples of studies on these topics contextualized in different cities and countries around the world. This is achieved by tackling five cross-cutting themes: the nature of the city’s environment as a backdrop for crime and fear; the dynamics of individuals’ daily routines and their transit safety; the safety perceptions experienced by those who are most in fear in public places; the metrics of crime and fear; and, finally, examples of current practices in promoting safety. All these original chapters contribute to our quest for safer, more inclusive, resilient, equitable and sustainable cities and human settlements aligned to the Global 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

London. Taylor and Francis. Imprint Routledge. 2020. 484p.

By Wilhelm Heitmeyer Simon Howell Sebastian Kurtenbach Abdul Rauf Muhammad Zaman Steffen Zdun. This book is the first comprehensive study of the street code concept attempting to determine if this concept and process exists in milieus beyond the United States, and if so where, and when it does, its extent, and how and why it is manifested. In sum, the purpose of the study is to provide “an international, cross-cultural comparison of the norms which define and make meaningful violence in three countries, namely Germany, South Africa, and Pakistan.

Open Access (2019) 196p.