The Urban Community

Part of the Sociology of the City series, originally published in 1959, this volume looks at the urban community bringing together rural and urban sociology. It advises that areas need to be looked at in terms the way of the life of the inhabitants and not by size and that urban sociology needs to assume a more global perspective, not just locally.

This engaging, age-appropriate set is designed to meet the early childhood social studies curriculum, where students learn about themselves and their community and what makes their community similar to and different from communities across the United States. By taking a kid-friendly Who's Who approach to different kinds of communities, these books teach students about the people who work to make each community a success. An urban community can be as big as the whole city or as small as a single apartment building. There are many people who make the urban community what it is. Students will enjoy this simply written text that explains who the members of the urban community are and what part they play in making the community a nice place to live.

MySearchLab provides students with a complete understanding of the research process so they can complete research projects confidently and efficiently. Students and instructors with an internet connection can visit www.MySearchLab.com and receive immediate access to thousands of full articles from the EBSCO ContentSelect database. In addition, MySearchLab offers extensive content on the research process itself—including tips on how to navigate and maximize time in the campus library, a step-by-step guide on writing a research paper, and instructions on how to finish an academic assignment with endnotes and bibliography. This reader traces the development of urban/community studies from the early days of the Chicago School of Human Ecology, through the “good old days” of ethnographies that made “Best Sellers” lists, right up to the most recent of writings about the cities and their communities. It emphasizes what is most modern, while still covering the history and sociology of urban studies–with all the hidden paradigms and evolution of ideas important to a comprehensive study of the subject. For public administration positions related to urban planning and housing.

The book compares different approaches to urban development in Singapore and Seoul over the past decades, by focusing on community participation in the transformation of neighbourhoods and its impact on the built environment and communal life. Singapore and Seoul are known for their rapid economic growth and urbanisation under a strong control of developmental state in the past. However, these cities are at a critical crossroads of societal transformation, where participatory and community-based urban development is gaining importance. This new approach can be seen as a result of a changing relationship between the state and civil society, where an emerging partnership between both aims to overcome the limitations of earlier urban development. The book draws attention to the possibilities and challenges that these cities face while moving towards a more inclusive and socially sustainable post-developmental urbanisation. By applying a comparative perspective to understand the evolving urban paradigms in Singapore and Seoul, this unique and timely book offers insights for scholars, professionals and students interested in contemporary Asian urbanisation and its future trajectories.

In Being Urban, Simon Goldhill and his team of outstanding urbanists explore the meaning of the urban condition, with particular reference to the Middle East. As Goldhill explains in his introduction, 'What is a good city?', five questions motivate the book: How can a city be systematically planned and yet maintain a possibility of flexibility, change, and the wellbeing of citizens? How does the city represent itself to itself, and image its past, its present and its future? What is it to dwell in, and experience, a city? How does violence erupt in and to a city, and what strategies of reconciliation and reconstruction can be employed? And finally, what is the relationship between the infrastructure of the city and the political process? Following the introduction, the twelve chapters are grouped into four sections: Engagement and Space; Infrastructure and Space; Conflict and Structures; and Curating the City. Through each chapter, the contributors reflect on aspects of urban infrastructure and culture, citizenship, belonging and exclusion, politics and conflict, with examples from across the Middle East, from Cairo to Tehran, Tel Aviv to Istanbul. Not only will Being Urban further understanding of the topography of citizenship in the Middle East and beyond, it will also contribute to answering one of today's key questions: What Is A Good City?

This edited collection investigates the human dimension of urban renewal, using a range of case studies from Africa, Asia, Europe, India and North America, to explore how the conception and delivery of regeneration initiatives can strengthen or undermine local communities. Ultimately aiming to understand how urban residents can successfully influence or manage change in their own communities, contributing authors interrogate the complex relationships between policy, planning, economic development, governance systems, history and urban morphology. Alongside more conventional methods, analytical approaches include built form analysis, participant observation, photographic analysis and urban labs. Appealing to upper level undergraduate and masters' students, academics and others involved in urban renewal, the book offers a rich combination of theoretical insight and empirical analysis, contributing to literature on gentrification, the right to the city, and community participation in neighbourhood change.

In recent years, concerned governments, businesses, and civic groups have launched ambitious programs of community development designed to halt, and even reverse, decades of urban decline. But while massive amounts of effort and money are being dedicated to improving the inner-cities, two important questions have gone unanswered: Can community development actually help solve long-standing urban problems? And, based on social science analyses, what kinds of initiatives can make a difference? This book surveys what we currently know and what we need to know about community development's past, current, and potential contributions. The authors--economists, sociologists, political scientists, and a historian--define community development broadly to include all capacity building (including social, intellectual, physical, financial, and political assets) aimed at improving the quality of life in low- to moderate-income neighborhoods. The book addresses the history of urban development strategies, the politics of resource allocation, business and workforce development, housing, community development corporations, informal social organizations, schooling, and public security.