Cities and the Political Geographies of the “New” Economy

Abstract

This chapter develops a scalar reinterpretation of contemporary political strategies to promote urban regeneration through the clustering of so-called new economy industries specialized in the production and deployment of advanced informational and communications technologies. In contrast to much of the hyperbole that has surrounded the new economy concept, this analysis of European trends suggests that urban growth strategies oriented toward such firms and sectors have generally involved rescaled, broadly market-disciplinary approaches to the regulation of uneven spatial development that seriously exacerbate, rather than resolve, the crisis tendencies and contradictions of post-Keynesian capitalism. However, despite their destabilizing macroeconomic consequences and the often vague, ideologically slippery spatial visions attached to projects to promote a new economy, such neoliberalizing regulatory rescalings continue to play a key role in the production of new urban spaces and new forms of urbanization.