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Turbulent presents, precarious futures: urbanization and the deployment of global infrastructure

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  • Alan Wiig
  • Jonathan Silver

Abstract

Understandings of global infrastructure within and between cities have primarily focused on two forms: the node and the corridor. Scholarship detailing the extensive growth of these infrastructures focus on standardization to account for the underlying networks configuring urbanization. However, standardization fails to account for the dynamic, contested and geographically uneven process of infrastructure deployment. Four generative concepts focus analysis on the stages of deployment: speculation, delineating, alignment and pivoting. After discussing China's Belt and Road Initiative as the underlying geoeconomic force driving the transformation of these systems, we present an illustrative case of the Central Corridor linking Dar es Salaam (Tanzania) and Kampala (Uganda) as emblematic of urbanization through global infrastructure. Concluding, we argue for a research agenda that places global infrastructure at the centre of how we understand urban transformation amid contemporary political–economic turbulence, one that emphasizes the contingent ways deployment proceeds.

Suggested Citation

  • Alan Wiig & Jonathan Silver, 2019. "Turbulent presents, precarious futures: urbanization and the deployment of global infrastructure," Regional Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 53(6), pages 912-923, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:regstd:v:53:y:2019:i:6:p:912-923
    DOI: 10.1080/00343404.2019.1566703
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    Cited by:

    1. Dorota Mi³ek, 2022. "Disparities in the level of regional technical infrastructure development in Poland: multicriteria analysis," Equilibrium. Quarterly Journal of Economics and Economic Policy, Institute of Economic Research, vol. 17(4), pages 1087-1113, December.
    2. Prince K Guma & Jethron Ayumbah Akallah & Jack Ong’iro Odeo, 2023. "Plug-in urbanism: City building and the parodic guise of new infrastructure in Africa," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 60(13), pages 2550-2563, October.
    3. Jorn Koelemaij, 2022. "The world’s number 1 real estate development exporter? Assessing announced transnational projects from the United Arab Emirates between 2003–2014," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 54(2), pages 226-246, March.
    4. Xiangming Chen, . "Change and continuity in special economic zones: a reassessment and lessons from China," UNCTAD Transnational Corporations Journal, United Nations Conference on Trade and Development.
    5. Tom Goodfellow & Zhengli Huang, 2021. "Contingent infrastructure and the dilution of ‘Chineseness’: Reframing roads and rail in Kampala and Addis Ababa," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 53(4), pages 655-674, June.
    6. Giles Mohan, 2021. "Below the Belt? Territory and Development in China's International Rise," Development and Change, International Institute of Social Studies, vol. 52(1), pages 54-75, January.
    7. Tim Summers, 2020. "Negotiating the boundaries of China’s Belt and Road Initiative," Environment and Planning C, , vol. 38(5), pages 809-813, August.
    8. Zhen Chen, 2021. "Research on the Innovation Imbalance Between Coastal and Inland Port Cities Along the Belt and Road: Based on the Three Helix Theory," SAGE Open, , vol. 11(1), pages 21582440219, February.
    9. Schulhof, Vera & van Vuuren, Detlef & Kirchherr, Julian, 2022. "The Belt and Road Initiative (BRI): What Will it Look Like in the Future?," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 175(C).
    10. Elke Beyer & Lucas-Andrés Elsner & Anke Hagemann & Philipp Misselwitz, 2021. "Industrial Infrastructure: Translocal Planning for Global Production in Ethiopia and Argentina," Urban Planning, Cogitatio Press, vol. 6(3), pages 444-463.
    11. J Miguel Kanai & Seth Schindler, 2022. "Infrastructure-led development and the peri-urban question: Furthering crossover comparisons," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 59(8), pages 1597-1617, June.

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