planning

In my courses I try to tell the story of urban modernity through a series of sub-stories. One of these is about how the Industrial Revolution happened. In 2012 I explained the Industrial Revolution thus: the key technology of the Industrial Revolution was the steam-engine; the key innovator of the steam-engine was Watt; and the […]

My favorite scene in the Harry Potter series of films happens towards the end of the third film, Prisoner of Azkaban, when the very-unlikable Professor Snape finds the three protagonists at the base of the Whomping Willow tree. He is about to bust them for rule-breaking when Ron Weasley points out that another teacher (Lupin)

[This is another political-economy posting, but it does not follow the previous postings as a series. After all, this is a blog; just thinking out loud here] This morning I had an epiphany about the changing structure of global production, trade, and prestige-politics in the 21st century. The argument: a shift in governing made intellectual

In this post I continue to use historical research to challenge present political rhetoric. Matt Groening paints a vivid picture of a businessman from the 1980s in Futurama. It is satirical, but satire is only so funny because of that disturbing ring of truth in the description of homo economicus and his contemptuous disregard for

This is the first in a series of postings about political economy. Over the past year I have been teaching about globalization. So I have had to clarify my own understanding of where we got ideas about macroeconomics and the debate between those who want to continue regulating national economies and those who want to

I got some interest in the map and analysis in the previous post, and upon request I have proceeded to overlay race data with foreclosure data. It should not surprise anyone that the news is grim. But better than a graph, a map shows disparities in space. So: The above image is the same foreclosure

On Sunday, March 25, one of the Occupy activists asked whether it would be possible to map out foreclosure hotspots in Oakland. The maps below are preliminary results of my findings. I got public data from the City of Oakland (light brown parcels), public data from Alameda County (light gray parcels), and foreclosure data from

Since about 1984 I have been interested in the Columbus myth. I think I was one of the last generations who learned what I call the ‘Columbus two-step:’ Step #1: Columbus-as-hero. You know the rhyme: “In 1492 Columbus sailed the ocean blue…,” discovered America and disproved the flat-earth myth. Thanks to him, here we are:

Ananya Roy introduced me to Benjamin’s work in 2008, through Susan Buck-Morss’ The dialectics of seeing (1989). I found the book maddeningly opaque, the first time I read it. Part of my challenge is that I come from a technical background embedded very much within the myths, ideologies, and assumptions of modernity. But after writing