Several complex challenges are emerging in cities: (de)industrialisation, bureaucratisation, gentrification and segregation, but also algorithmisation, datafication, energy transitions and climate change. These processes have different implications for the readiness for action and resilience of social groups to adapt to new situations. Some groups will struggle to respond well to the reduced publicness associated with urban transformations.
How do we ensure the proper development and co-creation of a resilient public future?
What is engaged urban "openness"? How are contemporary societies in the South and North transforming in response to various local and global developments?
To find answers, we bring together academic, cultural-institutional and civic networks from the Netherlands, Europe, the Middle East, Asia, Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean to compare and contrast current engagements shaped by colonial, post-colonial, decolonial and other geopolitical and socio-cultural realities. With this critical and interdisciplinary exploration of themes and challenges relating to development of urban areas, the Open Cities Platform connects two dynamic research networks of Utrecht University: the strategic theme Institutions for Open Societies and the Centre for Global Challenges.
