Co-creating ‘productive tension’ between stakeholders to support just urban transitions This post was written by Niamh Moore-Cherry, Dean Phelan, Madeleine Gan, Rachel McArdle and Brian Caulfield . Differential access to quality living environments in urban centres has been brought into …
From policy to practice in fragmented planning systems This post was written by Ebru Kurt-Özman. Setting the scene: Why we came together Held on July 8, 2025, at the AESOP Annual Congress in Istanbul, our UGoveRN roundtable titled “From Policy …
From Rembrandt to AI in the streets of Amsterdam This post was written by Tuna Tasan-Kok. As part of UGoveRN’s International Workshop on Digital Urban Governance, we kicked off our two-day event in Amsterdam with a unique walking excursion that …
This post was written by Tuna Taşan-Kok. As part of the UGoveRN-UP Dialogues Series, we were delighted to host Dr. Li Wan, Associate Professor of Urban Planning and Development at the University of Cambridge, Department of Land Economy, and Director …
This post was written by Elise F. Jansen. In this blog I describe the findings from my master thesis in Urban and Regional Planning titled “The influence of flexible densification policy on contractual arrangements of affordable housing”. The primary research …
This post was written by David Evers. [The text was originally published in Dutch in Rooilijn, which can be accessed here: https://www.rooilijn.nl/artikelen/zin-en-onzin-van-decentralisatie/] After two decades of decentralizing spatial planning, the National Environment and Planning Strategy (NOVI) announced more national control. Afterwards, …
This post was written by Emma Thümmel. Amsterdam is embarking on an ambitious plan to address its housing crisis by building 150 thousand new dwellings by 2050. Central to this plan is the densification of existing neighborhoods and areas around …
Beyond the blueprint This post was written by Elisha Aaron. The city of Amsterdam articulates in its “Structuurvisie 2040” a specific strategy to make the built environment of the city denser and more compact. This includes “building more than 5,000 …
What do we get if we bring together the interdisciplinary field of legal pluralism with the equally interdisciplinary field of urban studies? It is with this question in mind that the special issue editors of this issue—Danielle Chevalier, Michiel Stapper, …
This post was written by João Tonucci. My new publication, published in Urban Studies, addresses the overlooked dynamic between the state and informal land development in Global South metropolises, focusing on the Metropolitan Region of Belo Horizonte (MRBH) in Brazil. …
The challenges of territorial politics This post was written by Niamh Moore-Cherry. Internationally, the economic performance of cities – and particularly large cities – is considered crucial to national prosperity, giving rise to what has been termed a ‘metrophilia’ among …
This post was written by Alberto Bortolotti. When I began my PhD in urban planning, design, and policy at the Polytechnic University of Milano, I had the objective to keep investigating the linkages between cities and large-scale projects, which was …