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78214-01 - Seminar: Geographies of Power: Urban Violence in the (Post)Colonial City (3 CP)
| Semester | spring semester 2026 |
| Course frequency | Once only |
| Lecturers | Dany Tiwa (dany.tiwa@unibas.ch, Assessor) |
| Content | Course Description: This advanced seminar moves beyond pathological or sensationalist narratives to investigate the city as a primary site where violence is not merely contained, but actively produced, spatialized, and contested. We approach violence as a relational phenomenon, deeply embedded in the political, economic, and social fabric of the urban. The course critically examines how power, space, and identity intersect to normalize, perpetuate, and sustain various forms of violence, from the spectacular to the slow and systemic. The curriculum is structured to first deconstruct established typologies of violence (e.g., political, criminal, gendered, structural) and then transcend them, pushing students to analyze the interconnected logics that underpin them. We will engage with and critique key theoretical frameworks—from Interactionist and Structuralist to Feminist, Decolonial, and Poststructuralist approaches—paying particular attention to how enduring legacies of colonial urban planning, racial capitalism, and institutionalized inequality fundamentally shape the urban experience of violence. A core analytical thread is the dialectical relationship between urban space and violence. We will interrogate how a city’s material and symbolic organization—its architecture, infrastructure, borders, and planning regimes—can both inhibit and actively incubate conflict. Conversely, we will study how violence itself (re)shapes urban space, producing new geographies of fear, segregation, and resistance. Through in-depth empirical case studies from the Global North and South, students will learn to apply critical theory to analyze how specific urban contexts mediate the legitimacy of force and shape the emotional, political, and embodied responses to violent events. The seminar concludes by critically examining practices of resistance, resilience, and the contested politics of urban peace and security. Course structure: the seminar is organized around five thematic blocks: 1. Theorizing violence by deconstructing key frameworks. 2. Spatialities of violence is the city: analyzing the violence of planning and the planning of violence. 3. Political economies and institutions of violence. We will explore the roles of state and non-state actors, and the market. 4. The embodied and affective city. We will examine the cultural and phenomenological dimensions of violence. 5. Spatial practices of resistance and reclamation will help us critique and explore alternatives to securitization. |
| Learning objectives | Upon successful completion of this course, students will be able to: • Critique the city as a dynamic terrain where violence is politically produced and spatially contested. • Deconstruct established typologies of violence to reveal their underlying political and spatial logics. • Evaluate the utility and limitations of major theoretical frameworks for explaining violence in the contemporary capitalist city. • Articulate and analyze the dialectical relationship between a city’s spatial organization and the patterns of violence within it. • Apply advanced theoretical concepts from critical urban studies to empirical cases of urban violence. • Analyze how spatial, social, and historical contexts construct the legitimacy of violence and shape affective and political responses to it. |
| Bibliography | SESSION 1: INTRODUCTION Recommended Reading • Susanne Karstedt and Manuel Eisner: “Is a General Theory of Violence Possible?” IJCV: Vol. 3 (1) 2009, pp. 4 – 8 SESSION 2: CRITICAL URBAN CRIMINOLOGY & RELATIONAL VIOLENCE • Pavoni, A., & Tulumello, S. (2020). "What is Urban Violence?”, Progress in Human Geography, Vol. 44(1) 49–76 SESSION 3: INTERACTIONIST AND STRUCTURALIST FRAMEWORKS Recommended Reading • Katherine Hirschfeld (2017), “Rethinking “Structural Violence””, Soc 54:156–162 • Griselda Gutiérez Castaneda, (2025) “A Reading of Sexist Violence as Structural Violence”, Hypatia, Vol. 40, pp. 461-475 • Stefan Malthaner (2027), “Processes of Political Violence and the Dynamics of Situational Interaction”, IJCV, Vol. 11, pp. 1-10 • Randall Collins, (2009), “The micro-sociology of violence”, Volume 60 Issue 3, pp.566-576 SESSION 4: FEMINIST, DECOLONIAL & POSTSTRUCTURALIST INTERVENTIONS Recommended Reading • Rachel Pain (2001). "Gender, Race, Age, and Fear in the City". Urban Studies, vol.38 No°5-6, pp 899-913 • Freya Peters, Nick Clare & Thom Davies, “Necropolitics and Geography” Progress in Human Geography, 2025, Vol. 49(5) 466–488 • Frantz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth (excerpt on violence) SESSION 5: THE (POST)COLONIAL URBAN FABRIC: LEGACIES OF PLANNING AND PARTITION Recommended Reading • Rachel Gallagher (2025) “ Planning for dispossession: the continuing legacy of settler-colonialism in contemporary urban planning practices” Cities, Vol. 160, pp.1-13 • Gideon Baffoe & Shilpi Roy (2023) “Colonial legacies and contemporary urban planning practices in Dhaka, Bangladesh”, Planning Perspectives, 38:1, 173-19 SESSION 6: GEOGRAPHIES OF FEAR, SEGREGATION, AND RESISTANCE Recommended Reading • Diane Davis (2020) « City, Nation, Network: Shifting Territorialities of Sovereignty and Urban Violence in Latin America » Urban Planning, Volume 5, Issue 3, Pages 206–216 • Susan Forde (2022) “The violence of space and spaces of violence: Peace as violence in unequal and divided spaces” Political Geography, Volume 93, pp.1-9 • Simone Tulumello (2017) Fear, Space and Urban Planning: A critical Perspective from Southern Europe SESSION 7: BORDERS, ENCLAVES, INFRASTRUCTURAL VIOLENCE Recommended Reading • Daid Harvey (2008); “The Right to the City” • Andrea Pavoni and Simone Tulumello (2024) “Infra-structural Violence: On the Violence that Holds Us Together” Somatechnics, Volume 14, Issue 1 • Rachel Pain & Caitlin Cahill (2022) “Critical political geographies of slow violence and resistance” Politics and Space, Vol. 40(2) 359–372 • Danny Marks & John Connel (2024) “Unequal and unjust: The political ecology of Bangkok’s increasing urban heat island” Urban Studies, Vol. 61(15) 2887–2907 • Nerea Amoros Elorduy, Nikhilesh Sinha and Colin Mark (eds), (2024) Urban Informality and the Built Environment: Infrastructure, Exchange and Image” London: UCL Press. • Prentiss Dantzler, Elizabeth Korver-Glenn & and Junia Howell (2022) “Introduction: What Does Racial Capitalism Have to Do With Cities and Communities?” City & Community, Vol. 21(3) 163–172 • Lorena Melgaço & L.X. Pinto Coelho (2022) “Race and Space in the Postcolony: A Relational Study on Urban Planning Under Racial Capitalism in Brazil and South Africa", City & Community, Vol. 21(3) 214–237 • Rajyashree N Reddy (2018) “The urban under erasure: Towards a postcolonial critique of planetary urbanization” Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 2018, Vol. 36(3) 529–539 SESSION 8: HYBRID ORDERS Recommended Reading • Kate Meagher (2012) “The Strength of Weak States? Non-State Security Forces and Hybrid Governance in Africa” Development and Change, Vol. 43(5), pp. 1073-1101 • Thomas Risse (2012) “Governance Configurations in Areas of Limited Statehood: Actors, Modes, Institutions, and Resources” SFB-Governance Working Paper Series • No. 32 • Bruce Baker (2002) “When the Bakki Boys Came: Eastern Nigeria Confronts Vigilantism” Journal of Contemporary African Studies, Volume 20, Issue 2 SESSION 9: CULTURAL AND PHENOMENOLOGICAL DIMENSIONS OF URBAN VIOLENCE Recommended Reading • Jennifer Fluri & Amy Piedalue (2017) “Embodying violence: critical geographies of gender, race, and culture” Gender, Place & Culture. A Journal of Feminist Geography, Volume 24, Issue 4 • Michael Staudigl (2013) “Towards a Relational Phenomenology of Violence” Hum Stud, 36:43–66 • Jeff Ferrell (2013) “Cultural Criminology and the Politics of Meaning”, Critical Criminology, Volume 21, pages 257–271 SESSION 10: FROM SECURITIZATION TO ABOLITIONIST GEOGRAPHIES Recommended Reading • Alexandra Abello Colak, Melanie Lombard & Valeria Guarneros (2023) “Framing urban threats: A sociospatial analysis of urban securitization in Latin America and the Caribbean” Urban Studies, Vol. 60(14) 2741–2762 • Ian Ross Baran (2025) “Abolitionist infrastructures: Coalition Against Police Abuse, state violence, and the horizon of struggle” Society and Space, pp.1-20 • Charmaine Chua (2020) “Abolition Is A Constant Struggle: Five Lessons from Minneapolis” Theory and Event, Vol 23 (4) pp.127-147 SESSION 11: THE CONTESTED POLITICS OF URBAN PEACE Recommended Reading • Ivan Gusic (2022) “Peace between Peace(s)? Urban Peace and the Coexistence of Antagonists in City Spaces” Journal of Intervention and Statebuilding, 16:5, 619-640, • Annika Björkdahl (2016) “Introduction: Peacebuilding through the lens of friction” • Emma van Santen (2019): “Inclusive peace mediation in the city: spatial segregation of violence and urban politics of ‘social’ inclusion in gang truces”, Third World Thematics: A TWQ Journal SESSION 12: CONCLUDING REMARKS |
| Comments | The course is open to Master students from other programs with a priority for MA Students in Critical Urbanisms and in Changing Societies on timely registration. Max. capacity 20 (first come, first served). The room for the first session will be confirmed soon |
| Admission requirements | registration mandatory |
| Language of instruction | English |
| Use of digital media | No specific media used |
| Interval | Weekday | Time | Room |
|---|---|---|---|
| wöchentlich | Wednesday | 14.15-16.00 | Alte Universität, Seminarraum -201 |
Dates
| Date | Time | Room |
|---|---|---|
| Wednesday 18.02.2026 | 14.15-16.00 | Alte Universität, Seminarraum -201 |
| Wednesday 25.02.2026 | 14.15-16.00 | Fasnachtswoche |
| Wednesday 04.03.2026 | 14.15-16.00 | Alte Universität, Seminarraum -201 |
| Wednesday 11.03.2026 | 14.15-16.00 | Alte Universität, Seminarraum -201 |
| Wednesday 18.03.2026 | 14.15-16.00 | Alte Universität, Seminarraum -201 |
| Wednesday 25.03.2026 | 14.15-16.00 | Alte Universität, Seminarraum -201 |
| Wednesday 01.04.2026 | 14.15-16.00 | Alte Universität, Seminarraum -201 |
| Wednesday 08.04.2026 | 14.15-16.00 | Alte Universität, Seminarraum -201 |
| Wednesday 15.04.2026 | 14.15-16.00 | Alte Universität, Seminarraum -201 |
| Wednesday 22.04.2026 | 14.15-16.00 | Alte Universität, Seminarraum -201 |
| Wednesday 29.04.2026 | 14.15-16.00 | Alte Universität, Seminarraum -201 |
| Wednesday 06.05.2026 | 14.15-16.00 | Alte Universität, Seminarraum -201 |
| Wednesday 13.05.2026 | 14.15-16.00 | Alte Universität, Seminarraum -201 |
| Wednesday 20.05.2026 | 14.15-16.00 | Alte Universität, Seminarraum -201 |
| Wednesday 27.05.2026 | 14.15-16.00 | Alte Universität, Seminarraum -201 |
| Modules |
Modul: Sachthemen der Ethnologie (Bachelor's degree subject: Anthropology) Modul: Theory and General Anthropology (Master's degree subject: Anthropology) Modul: Transfer: Europa interdisziplinär (Master's degree program: European History in Global Perspective) Module: Conflicts and Peacebuilding (Master's degree program: Changing Societies: Migration – Conflicts – Resources) Module: Europeanization and Globalization (Master's Studies: European Global Studies) Module: Fields: Environment and Development (Master's degree program: African Studies) Module: Fields: Governance and Politics (Master's degree program: African Studies) Module: The Urban across Disciplines (Master's degree program: Critical Urbanisms) Specialization Module Global Europe: Work, Migration and Society (Master's Studies: European Global Studies) |
| Assessment format | continuous assessment |
| Assessment details | pass / fail |
| Assessment registration/deregistration | Reg.: course registration; dereg.: not required |
| Repeat examination | no repeat examination |
| Scale | Pass / Fail |
| Repeated registration | no repetition |
| Responsible faculty | Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, studadmin-philhist@unibas.ch |
| Offered by | Fachbereich Urban Studies |