 | Decentring Urban Governance: Narratives, Resistance and Contestation Subjects: Geography; Politics & International Relations; Development Studies Environment Social Work Urban Studies; Urban Studies; Anthropology; Urban Studies; Urban Politics; Human Geography; Government; Public Administration & Management; Urban Geography; Governance; Urban Politics; Public Policy; Decentring Urban Governance seeks to rethink governance not as a particular state formation, but as the diverse policies emerging associated with the impact of modernist social science on policy making, considering the diverse meanings that inspire governing practices across time, space, and policy sectors in urban context. Taking an interdisciplinary approach, the book goes beyond neoliberalism, and is interested in other webs of meaning through which actors encounter, interpret, and evaluate social science, which have received less analytical attention. All these different webs of meaning - elite narratives, social science, and local traditions - influence patterns of action. The book creates an analytical space by which to consider situated agency and localised resistance to the discourses and policies of political elites, including the myriad ways in which local actors have resisted practices of governance on the ground. This text will be of key interest to scholars, students and practitioners of urban governance, governance and more broadly to the social sciences, housing, social policy, law and welfare studies. Mark Bevir is a Professor of Political Science, and the Director of the Center for British Studies, at the University of California, Berkeley, USA. He is the author of various books including The Making of British Socialism (2011), Governance: A Very Short Introduction (2012) and A Theory of Governance (2013). Kim McKee is a Senior Lecturer and Director of the Centre for Housing Research at the University of St Andrews, UK. She has published widely on the governance of low-income housing, with strong interests in the contested nature of contemporary governing practices. Peter Matthews is a Lecturer in Social Policy and leader of the Public Services and Governance research group within the Faculty of Social Sciences at the University of Stirling, UK. |
