Justice and Fairness in the City: A Multi-Disciplinary Approach to 'Ordinary' Cities

Fairness and justice are buzzwords in contemporary political debates across the world. In the United Kingdom, especially, Prime Minister David Cameron has made a serious effort to claim fairness as a key Conservative concept, while the Labour Party has attempted to redefine and claim social justice. Local governments have taken up this discourse of fairness, with fairness commissions intended to develop principles and practical proposals to promote fairer cities appearing in Islington, Liverpool, Newcastle, Sheffield, York, Blackpool, and Tower Hamlets, among others. Contributors to this volume draw on planning, politics, geography, ethics, education, law, and urban design to examine this phenomenon in theory and practice across four broad categories: well being and local environmental justice; education, young people, and fair opportunities; mobility, spatial justice, and the right to the city; and participation, procedural fairness, and social justice. Throughout, they reflect on the key role of the city in the twenty-first-century global political economy and the stark juxtaposition of radically unequal lives within contemporary urban spaces.