Critical commentary

Urban Studies
2017, Vol. 54(1) 31–43
Ó Urban Studies Journal Limited 2016
The post-political trap? Reflections Reprints and permissions:
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on politics, agency and the city DOI: 10.1177/0042098016671477
usj.sagepub.com

Ross Beveridge
University of Glasgow, UK

Philippe Koch
Institute Urban Landscape, Zurich University of Applied Sciences, Switzerland

Abstract
This commentary reflects on the influence of the post-political critique on urban studies. In this
literature (e.g. Swyngedouw, 2014), the default position of contemporary democracies is post-
politics – the truly political is only rare, random and radical. The ‘post-political trap’ refers to the
intuitively convincing, yet ultimately confining account it provides of contemporary urban govern-
ance. We identify three shortcomings. First, the binary understanding of the real political/politics
as police negates the in-betweenness and contingency of actually existing urban politics. By so
doing, secondly, political agency is reduced to the heroic and anti-heroic. Thus, the plurality of
political agency in the urban sphere and multi-faceted forms of power lose their political quality.
Third, the perceived omnipotence of the post-political order actually diminishes the possibilities
of the urban as a political space of resistance and emancipation. On these grounds we argue not
for a rejection of the notion of the post-political per se but for a more differentiated approach,
one more alert to the contingencies of the political and of depoliticisation in the urban realm.

Keywords
depoliticisation, economics, politics, post-political, urban

Received March 2015; accepted September 2015

The post-political trap? populated by politicians and civil servants

but they operate in the thin wedge of local
Imagine a largely homogeneous city centre autonomy, constrained by the global level.
with few meaningful public spaces, a busi- Suddenly, however, something changes –
ness district populated with two or three call centre workers take to the streets
skyscrapers belonging to multi-nationals of
medium global and high local importance,
suburbs comprising the odd gated commu- Corresponding author:
Ross Beveridge, Urban Studies Foundation Senior Research
nity nestled in between sprawling high-rise Fellow, Urban Studies, University of Glasgow, 25 Bute
estates. In this city, politics is rarely seen or Gardens, Glasgow G12 8RS, UK.
even thinkable. The town hall may still be Email: ross.beveridge@glasgow.ac.uk
32 Urban Studies 54(1)

demanding an end to low wages provided by potency, it is important to know and fully
one of the multi-nationals. A union is consider the implications of this perspective
involved. An urban social movement devel- on urban politics. To do this, we provide a
ops and the strike threatens to spread to other three-part critique of the post-political the-
groups of workers. In the course of the pro- sis. First, we highlight problems with the
test, police deny them access to the street out- ontological claims about politics made by
side the multi-national’s office on the grounds Rancière and others, arguing that the binary
that it is the company’s property. The cam- conception of the political/politics as police
paign continues, goals remain local but have a order is too narrow a basis to capture the
universal ring (fair working wage, etc.). contingencies of actually existing urban poli-
Pressure is exerted on local politicians who tics. Second, the constricted but universalised
respond by stressing that there is nothing they understanding of the political/politics reduces
can do as wages are generally regulated by the realm of political action, denying the plur-
national legislation and the company is not ality of political agency apparent in the urban
breaking the law. The company itself responds sphere. Third, we show that Swyngedouw’s
to the strikes by threatening to move aspects assertion that urban politics is experiencing a
of its operations – and many jobs – elsewhere. post-political historical condition suggests an
This fictional episode in urban politics omnipresent and omnipotent order. As well
contains a few clichés, but these harbour as lacking an empirical basis, such claims
depressing truths. Privatisation of urban arguably diminish the possibilities of the
space is increasing, the horizons of urban pol- urban as a political space of resistance and
itics appear stunted, the scope for urban acti- emancipation – the very features which pro-
vism constrained by the power of global vide the foundation to counter post-politics in
capital. On these grounds, one can quite eas- the city. Ultimately, the ‘post-political trap’
ily understand the appeal of the post-political refers to the compelling, yet ultimately confin-
city thesis as propagated by Swyngedouw ing account it provides critically-minded
(e.g. 2007, 2009, 2011, 2014) (following in researchers of contemporary urban politics.
particular Jacques Rancière, Slavoj Žižek and We conclude the piece by proposing ways of
Alain Badiou). His post-political city is re-aligning the field of enquiry. In particular
largely devoid of politics, enervated, subject we argue not for a rejection of the post-
to the whims of global economic forces, gov- political perspective but a more plural under-
erned through managerial consensus-driven standing of politics and depoliticisation, one
political systems. But would we, still following that better accounts for contingency and the
Swyngedouw, want to dismiss the workers’ continuing multiplicity of political agency in
campaign for better wages, the union sup- cities. There is a need, we conclude, for a
porting them and the social movement which more fundamental discussion about urban
arises as not really being ‘political’? Indeed, politics per se (what it is, what we would like
would we, as urban researchers, argue that it to be), and not just in relation to the post-
such agency corrupts the urban ‘political’ and political thesis itself.
impedes the flourishing of urban democracy?
And if we did, what would be the conse-
The post-political thesis
quences for our understanding of urban
governance? Notions such as the ‘post-democratic’
This article argues that while the post- (Crouch, 2004), ‘post-politics’ (Mouffe, 2005)
political city thesis has a broad-brush and the ‘post-political’ (Rancière, 2009)
Beveridge and Koch 33

speak of a contemporary democratic condi- praised for prompting dispute, for bringing a
tion in which genuine contestation and con- new edge to critical thinking on ‘govern-
flicting claims about the world are not ance’, for provoking us to re-think the city
apparent. Such theorising rests on the under- politically and to consider afresh the nature
standing that the post-Cold War period has and scope of contemporary urban politics as
witnessed a new political and economic set- well as the possibilities and means for achiev-
tlement centred on the norms and interests of ing change.
the global market, and an intellectual climate But is he entirely right? If he is, the nor-
and governance structures in which a fetish mative implications are devastating not only
for consensus has foreclosed proper political for urban politics but, given the political
debate (Žižek, 2008). The general thrust of and economic significance of cities, for
this post-politics, post-political literature is national democratic systems in their entirety.
that the political realm has been hollowed Through the post-political lens, institutional
out or that the political itself has disappeared cornerstones securing the legitimacy of con-
(e.g. Rancière, 2003; Mouffe, 2005; Žižek, temporary politics are nothing but a charade
2008), that the parameters of political discus- to obscure the hidden interests benefitting
sion and political action have narrowed to from and guiding policies, while radical and
preclude alternatives to neoliberalism (e.g. reformist efforts made within established
Crouch, 2004). Political apathy, citizen cyni- institutions will always be ineffective and,
cism and (economic) elite control behind the even worse, only serve to further embed the
facade of formal democratic political systems post-political order.
are central concerns, as is the commensurate Something of a lament for the demise of
rise in populism and political protest around the socialist alternative, the post-political
the world. narrative is steered by leftist political persua-
These arguments have been translated by sions, but even for those who share these
Swyngedouw (e.g. 2007, 2009) into thinking sympathies there are problems. The thesis
on cities. He observes an urban politics that urban politics is monolithically post-
reduced to consensus, excavated of the truly political, post-democratic or depoliticised has,
political, constructed through empty signif- correctly, been challenged (e.g. Darling, 2014;
iers like the ‘global city’ or the ‘creative city’. Larner, 2014; McCarthy, 2013; MacLeod and
All that is left in this (formerly) political Jones, 2011: footnote 19). In what follows,
realm is the management and policing/pol- our arguments are not novel, but we believe
icy-making of the consensus (Swyngedouw, that taken together they contribute to a more
2010). It is one in which political decision considered understanding of a notion (the
making is virtually pre-ordained, led by glo- post-political or post-democratic city) that
bal public-private administrative elites, where is increasingly used, almost as short-hand,
the outcomes of policy-making – what is pos- to describe the ills of contemporary urban
sible, desirable and who should be included governance.
and excluded – are virtually known in
advance (Swyngedouw, 2007). Consequently, More than meets the (post-
truly political action finds – exasperated – political) eye: A three-part
expression in urban political violence from
critique
the margins.
Swyngedouw has certainly succeeded in The strength of an academic concept lies
transforming the debate on urban politics largely in its focus and its ability to encapsu-
(see MacLeod, 2011). His work should be late concerns shared by a diverse set of
34 Urban Studies 54(1)

academics. The post-political thesis certainly movement, amongst others). Here, the politi-
fulfils these conditions. For empirical cal is an antagonistic moment that questions
research it is helpful because it opens a win- or challenges existing orders, ways of doing
dow to power in urban politics. From this things, enshrined spatialities and normalised
perspective, urban politics might be distorted social relations; it ‘disrupts the established
not only because the interests of powerful order of things’ (Dikec x, 2012: 674) and pro-
agencies are systemically privileged over vides new political imaginaries enabling pub-
those from deprived groups but because lic contestation and deliberation. In this view,
some conflicts never occur and some ideas the political emerges rather than having a
and actors are systematically foreclosed. proper place; the political moment is sponta-
However, we argue that there is a proble- neous and pure (Uitermark and Nicholls,
matic understanding of the relation between 2014; cf. Mouffe, 2013) and challenges the
the ‘political’, processes of depoliticisation boundaries between ‘the political’ and ‘the
and the empirical effects of depoliticisation. apolitical’. As a consequence, the political is
short-lived and by implication cannot be
long-term, institutionalised or gradual – the
The purity of the ‘political’: Reducing
political act is the backroom door being
actually existing urban politics to police knocked down, bringing to a shuddering halt
order the politics ongoing behind. The political is
For all the potency of the post-political city not articulated through elections or other
thesis, it suffers from the understanding that processes of ‘actually existing instituted
the truly political exists only in moments, (post-) democracy’ (Swyngedouw, 2014:
and that post-politics is the default position 171). The political can only ever be apart
of contemporary democracy (Swyngedouw, from the state and political system and hence
2011, 2014: 175–177). This stark, binary is not to be found in parliament or meeting
view relies most heavily on the thinking of rooms but on the street or square.
Rancière, who insisted ‘on the impossibility This conception implies a sharp division
of the institutionalization of democracy and, between a true and pure moment (‘the politi-
consequently, on the abyss between any cal’) on the one hand and blurred and affir-
instituted order (the police) and the demo- mative forms of actions (‘politics’) on the
cratic presumption of equality (the political)’ other. This binary conception insinuates that
(Swyngedouw, 2011: 376). As Swyngedouw the political is ‘truly’ political only in the
(2007: 605) points out, ‘Rancière’s political sense that it might subvert the existing order
philosophical mission . is to re-centre the of things and the established hierarchies of
‘‘political’’ as distinct from ‘‘policy’’ (what he power. By definition, only the discrete and
calls ‘‘the police’’)’. Synonymising actually scarce political has the potency to effect real
existing politics with the police was of course change. In this view, politics per se is not
a deliberately political move by Rancière, one political and is even the mobilisation of the
designed to deny contemporary political sys- apparatuses of the political system against
tems the very essence of their claims – to pro- the emergence of the political (Swyngedouw,
vide for the political and ensure democracy. 2014: 170–171). Subjects, actions and ideas
Following Rancière, writers employing are not political unless they fulfil the ideal of
the post-political label generally understand the democratic articulation of claims.
true political actions in terms of gestures, The problem with this perspective is two-
interventions and polemic scenes (as practiced fold. First, it often remains unclear if state-
by the Spanish Indignados and the Occupy ments are made on ontological or ontic
Beveridge and Koch 35

grounds (Marchart, 2011). Second, the empiri- effect, nothing left to study. Hence, the
cal consequences of adopting these positions notion of the post-political trap – once
are problematic. enticed in, there is nowhere else for argu-
The post-foundational theorists (e.g. mentation to go.
Rancière, Mouffe, Badiou, etc.), from whom Yet, in the real world, there appear to be
Swyngedouw draws his inspiration, share many actors who have an interest in challen-
the common idea of the political difference ging the existing order of things and some of
(Marchart, 2011) that differentiates between those engage with or work within the so-
the political as the constitutive element of called police order. To say this is not to
our social world and politics as everyday, reject outright Rancière’s understanding of
real-world conflicts addressing those social the political but rather to insist that his
relations.1 The political can, then, be per- claim is an ontological rather than an
ceived as an ontological category whilst poli- empirical one (resting on the need for revo-
tics (or police order) is an ontic actualisation lutionary change and the way in which that
of the political. Both terms operate, hence, change occurs) and that other ontologies of
on different analytical levels. They do not the political shed a different light on what
delimit different terrains on the same map. politics might be. For example, we might
Rather the political defines the cartographic follow those scholars who have focused on
principles of the map while politics delimits the associative dimension constituting the
the areas of conflict on the map. They do political, with the work of Hannah Arendt
touch, however. Obviously the political (1958) being emblematic here. According to
shapes the conflicts that may or may not Arendt, people create a political domain by
come into focus and, in reverse, politics, the acting and speaking in plurality in the pres-
phenomenal world of political action, influ- ence of others and thus creating a space of
ences the way we build our fundamental appearance. By and through the political,
sense of the social world. Important as the people are liberated from their private iden-
political difference is in post-politics studies, tities and appear as public subjects.
the analytical implications of the political Intersubjectivity and the associative power
difference are not always carefully consid- of the political are keys to this understand-
ered (Marchart, 2011). ing. The actors who actually create this
If the political and politics do not belong space of appearance represent a segment of
to the same analytical register, it is impossi- the population or the public without for-
ble empirically as well as normatively to mally being mandated to do so. They are
judge or evaluate the radical or emancipa- not elected, but they act in the name of a
tory quality of actually existing politics by large collectivity or social group. They sig-
comparing it to philosophical arguments nify a particular public in the sense of dar-
about a distinct definition of the political as stellen, even though they do not represent
an ontological category. If you do so, poli- (vertreten) this public (see Kohn, 2013). The
tics is always disappointing and deficient. creation or staging of a collectivity unrepre-
Presumably, this is also the reason why there sented before is, from this perspective, a gen-
are so few empirical studies investigating the uine political act. It opens up new
political quality or character of political opportunities for distinct, even emancipa-
actions or the historical genesis of the alleged tory forms of subjectivications.
post-political order. If Grand Politics is not There is a link here to the emerging litera-
from this world and everything else is ture on mobilising concepts of representa-
already tainted by post-politics there is, in tion. Disch (2011: 104) argues, for instance,
36 Urban Studies 54(1)

that ‘it is only through representation that a The mundane, the small, the gradual, the
people comes to be seen as a political agent, reformist and conservative lose their politi-
one capable of putting forward a demand’. cal import – they are post-political, their
The associative perspective on the political agencies intrinsically part of the reification
emphasises the performative effect of collec- of the post-political apparatus.
tive action. Long-term, backbreaking work According to this view, even radical urban
within political institutions can make a dif- activism in the register of ‘politics’ (i.e. con-
ference to some citizens. cerned with concrete social-spatial interven-
Hence, the binary understanding of the tions) reproduces rather than undermines
political vs. politics as police order can and the post-political condition:
should be problematised with regard to the
analytical level it speaks to – the ontological Such expressions of protest that are framed
or the ontic. Instead of just deducing an his- fully within the existing police order are, in the
torical condition we seem to live in from current post-politicising arrangement, already
reflections on the ontological foundations of fully acknowledged and accounted for .
politics, we argue that urban post-politics or They are positively invited as expressions of
the proper functioning of ‘democracy’, and
depoliticisation is an empirical puzzle and
become instituted through public-private sta-
should be treated accordingly. keholder participatory forms of governance,
succumbing to the tyranny of ‘participation’.
(Swyngedouw, 2014: 177)
Shrinking political agency: True politics and
political agency can only be rare and Presumably, then, Swyngedouw would
random dismiss the call centre workers campaigning
However, from its ontological foundations, for better wages in our fictionalised account
the second constrictive element of the post- as not acting in a truly political way. As he
political trap becomes apparent: the concep- states, ‘the political is not about expressing
tual understanding of political actions. The demands to the elites to rectify inequalities
post-politics perspective does not deny the or unfreedoms’ (Swyngedouw, 2014: 174).
continuing contingencies and contestations True political agency does not engage with
of power relations (e.g. Swyngedouw, 2014: political systems, the existing police order.
168–170) but rather casts political agency Rather, like some of the Occupy movements,
solely as a revolutionary act (Darling, 2014: it confronts them by denying them, by ignor-
74–75). Hence it portrays genuinely political ing their conventions. In his most recent
agency – like the genuinely political itself – work on urban post-politics, Swyngedouw
as inherently in opposition to agencies (2014) spends some time dismissing the inter-
within actually existing politics/the police ventions of contemporary urban activists,
order. Politics is seen as populated by man- who engage in the ‘micro-politics of local
agerial nobodies, encased in the apparatuses urban struggles’ against environmental pol-
of market-oriented, state-enforced consen- lution, for example (Swyngedouw, 2014:
sus. In short, there is not much of a spec- 176). Ultimately, their actions are seen to
trum of political agency. Indeed, the realm elevate the social and the particular to the
of possibilities, the potentialities and plural- political realm and thereby impinge upon its
ity of agency are reduced to the heroic (the true emancipatory potential (Swyngedouw,
‘libegalitarians’), anti-heroic (the amorphous 2014).
post-political subjects)2 and demagogic (the This has potent normative and theoretical
populists profiting from the lack of politics). implications. The conception of a pure,
Beveridge and Koch 37

grand and true political leads to the idealisa- the overwhelming majority of – political
tion of radical interventions not only from movements, organisations and agencies that
grassroots leftist movements but potentially operate on the local scale as not being politi-
from all political strands. Furthermore, if cal because they employ different strategies
there is nothing left apart from the radical to resist oppression.
gesture, what moral, political and strategic
options remain open to actors? Mouffe
(2013) takes issue with those radical scholars Omnipresent and omnipotent: The post-
(and activists) who propose a withdrawal political condition
from all existing institutions, a rejection of Allied to this narrow conception of the polit-
representation and the goal of establishing ical and political agency is a heavily struc-
majorities. She argues that this avoids the turalist account of the post-political
realities of political power, which is always arrangements which deny the political.
territorialised (i.e. it emerges within concrete Swyngedouw’s arguments about contempo-
settings). Strategies3 to overcome forms of rary urban conditions can only hold through
hegemony must engage with visible nodes of the presumption of omnipresent and omni-
power, which ultimately are apparent in potent structures. Herein lies the third ele-
existing institutions of politics (and the ment of the trap – the post-political city is a
police). If not, radical politics denies its theoretical point of reference rather than an
political potential and reproduces the very analytical conclusion on the basis of detailed
post-political condition it wants to attack – and coherent empirical observations. The
by not directly engaging with the institutions post-political condition is too often presup-
of power through which it operates. posed as a matter of fact rather than interro-
But it is precisely this form of ‘urban gated as a matter of concern (Larner, 2014:
insurgency’ that Swyngedouw (2014: 174) 192).4 It might be argued that for the thesis to
privileges as political, as having the potential truly hold, the condition has to be presup-
to get us out of the post-political quagmire. posed. As stated above, if we depart from the
Hence, it is the staged and symbolic actions assumption that politics is fundamentally anti-
of many of the Occupy movements of 2011 political and we are experiencing a post-
and the Spanish Indignados to which we political age, it is easier to explain away the
should turn to research the genuinely politi- disappointments and deficiencies we inevitably
cal and radical in urban governance. come across: they are the result of the truly
Regardless of the merits of these forms of political to emerge. The actual operations of
agency, this is an extremely narrow concep- the post-political, along with a vast range of
tualisation of political agency. And it is one political agencies, fall outside of the theoretical
that allows us little hope of breaking free lens, are not accounted for in the thesis.
from the post-political condition, precisely Hence, this is, then, a field of urban
because it is so specific in its conditions and research dominated by theoretical asser-
hence seldom in its occurrence. While a legit- tions, lacking in empirical research – a sense
imate argument could be made that genu- of actually existing post-politics. And it
inely radical political acts do occur so rarely, shows. The literature on post-politics is
it is more problematic to equate them – and dominated by the description of meta-level
only them – with the political. As a conse- discourses and ultimately relies on the analy-
quence, and this is the second element of the sis of structures rather than agencies. As
trap, a post-political perspective on the city Raco and Lin (2012: 195) have observed,
entails viewing the agencies of many – if not even if urban ‘policy agendas appear to take
38 Urban Studies 54(1)

on postpolitical forms and rationalities, this Depressingly, there may be a lot of truth
does not necessarily mean that very real in this. However, this does not mean that
divergences and conflicts have been, or can researchers should deny the likelihood of
easily be, eradicated’. change or, moreover, in the case of
Swyngedouw argues that the post- Swyngedouw (following Rancière), prescribe
political is a condition, globally occurring, the way in which it will occur (via the heroic
part of the contemporary urban fabric. Even radical). Nor should they make ontological
according to its own reading of the age, (or ontic) and conceptual claims which effec-
however, there is a politics to the post- tively negate the political import of multiple
political condition – neoliberalism – and the forms of agency, institutions and ideas, as
key features of this condition (e.g. main- well as much hope, before they even appear.
stream political consensus around the mar- Therefore, while we agree that the post-
ket interests of the global economy) are political thesis is potent in capturing the
ongoing political achievements (Dean, 2009: spirit of the current political malaise, espe-
23). Perhaps this contingency explains why cially depoliticisation in formal politics, it
it seems hard to pin down post-politics (and does present a rather monolithic view, one
research) in urban contexts. Raco and Lin which exists more convincingly on the theo-
(2012) go on to make the point that urban retical than the empirical plane.
agents of post-politics are nowhere to be
seen in much of the literature; and hence the
very specific local forms post-political con- Diminishing the urban as a political space
structs like sustainability take are difficult to Far from the common imaginary of the city
explain. Rather, the discourse and the police as a vibrant political space, the post-political
apparatuses, with their ability to reproduce city thesis portrays the urban as a bleak
globally, are sources of explanation. Post- depoliticised terrain. Indeed, it questions the
political arrangements are omnipotent and symbiosis between the city and politics. The
omnipresent. They also appear to be fairly difficulty this presents is not that the litera-
unchanging. Much is assumed about the ture completely denies the ongoing contin-
fixed nature of political agendas, top-level gency of urban space, of particular places,
institutional level decision making and all but that it marginalises the possibilities for
sorts of backroom, behind closed-door inter- the political contestation of and in the city.
actions. As a consequence, the literature has Through its assertion that there is a post-
a certain fatalistic tone. Post-politics tends political urban condition, the possibilities of
to happen to people, who occasionally react the city, or ‘spaces of hope’ (Harvey, 2000)
with radical reassertions of the political but within the city, are diminished. The urban
generally do not. As Crouch states, there is police order is universal and all-encompass-
ultimately little reason to act given the small ing, the urban political is isolated and ran-
likelihood of achieving change: ‘Under the dom. In a sense, the thesis, taken to its
conditions of a post-democracy that increas- logical conclusion, undermines the under-
ingly cedes power to business lobbies, there standing of the city as a site of struggle and
is little hope for an agenda of strong egali- possibility as well as compliance and fatal-
tarian policies for the redistribution of ism. If truly political agency is seen exclu-
power and wealth, or for the restraint of sively, in that it must exist outside of the
powerful interests’ (Crouch, 2004: 4, cited in urban post-political order, and if ‘political
Swyngedouw, 2011: 371). space is a space of contestation inaugurated
Beveridge and Koch 39

by those who have no name and no place’ of the city globally, to focus on struggle and
(see Swyngedouw, 2014: 178), then the conflict, without referring to very specific
potential of the urban to foster true politics recipes of how urban contest and politics
shrinks. Ultimately, the post-political city should occur.
thesis seems to deny the potential of many If we determine that urban research
of the forms of urban politics and agency should be saved from the post-political trap,
with which its proponents might normally how, then, should we research urban politics
sympathise. and depoliticisation? We close this commen-
tary by making a number of modest sugges-
tions. They do not involve substituting
Saving the city: Researching optimism for the pessimism of the post-
depoliticisation, avoiding the political thesis. Nor do they rest on an abso-
post-political trap lute rejection of Swyngedouw’s arguments.
Surely, it is better on empirical and ontologi- Rather, they reassert contingency and, along
cal grounds to adopt a more open view of with it, a measure of hope.
the potential of the city as a place of struggle
and a site of (radical) political agency. The 1. Depoliticisation reshapes rather than
urban as a heterotopia (Foucault, 1967/
obliterates the political
2008), both phantasma and concrete place,
yields political agency through specific con- In line with recent theoretical work across
ditions for subjectivation. So to think of the the social sciences, future urban research
true political space as a universal space pro- should explicitly consider both depoliticisation
duced and shaped by placeless agents denies and (re)politicisation within the same analyti-
the political potential of cities as distinct cal lens, as being often dynamically interlinked
social formations. Of course, cities are pivo- (Chatterton et al., 2012; Featherstone and
tal to the global economy as generators of Korf, 2012; Hay, 2007; Jessop, 2014).
wealth and nodes in trade and communica- Depoliticisation can be understood more as a
tion. They have become prime sites of neo- contingent political strategy than a political
liberal ‘accumulation through dispossession’ condition (although general democratic chal-
(Harvey, 2003), the concentration of wealth lenges are accepted). Empirically, politicisa-
through privatisation and commoditisation tions and new forms of democratic politics
of public assets. Urban politics is starkly continue to be apparent. As Keane (2009)
shaped by the depoliticising effects of global argues, with his notion of the ‘monitory
change. However, urban struggles of many democracy’, direct power scrutinising mechan-
hues have been very apparent (e.g. in 2011), isms, such as participatory budgeting, have
and the dialectical intensity of global-local become ever more important in democratic
interconnections in cities provides opportu- politics. Their potential to resist the ‘tyranny
nities for the (local) contestation of global of participation’ (Swyngedouw, 2014: 177), the
processes. Hence, as we observe cities gain contingent and local politics they produce,
importance around the globe, in terms of should be ontologically accepted and empiri-
population, of social cohesion, of economic cally researched.
value and political struggle, we would expect Depoliticisation is inherently related to
sites of contestation to multiply as ever ‘the political’ and its counterpart ‘the non-
larger parts of the population start to live political’ (or ‘apolitical’). A consequence of
and work in cities. Hence it is necessary to seeing depoliticisation and politicisation as
account for the increasingly contested nature inherently linked is that we accept that the
40 Urban Studies 54(1)

boundaries of the political cannot be fixed in on the practices to articulate, remove, dis-
essential terms – as a pure and discrete place or obstruct urban conflicts as/from the
realm. The distinction between the political political. It could ask how political agency in
and apolitical realm becomes a matter of urban politics is conditioned by the bound-
empirical investigation and not definition. aries of the political and the resulting possi-
Research might want to address how the bilities for subjectivations.
definition of the political – through discur- A key component of depoliticisation is to
sive and institutional practices – reshuffles deny the legitimacy of agents, interests or
the practices of politics. Indeed, the exact, claims as political, as of general concern (see
albeit never fixed, drawing of the boundary Rancière on the production of the common).
between the two is an integral part of (de)po- So, depoliticisation is about redrawing
liticisation and the normative and institu- boundaries, limiting the scope of contesta-
tional ordering of politics which emerges tion and restricting the ways people make
from it. Depoliticisation will always, through sense of themselves as political agents. ‘For
the politics its silences, create the conditions this reason it is probable that there exist a
for its own depoliticisation and to under- great number of potential conflicts in the
stand this interplay is key to comprehending community which cannot be developed
the possibilities of urban politics. because they are blotted out by stronger sys-
tems of antagonism’ (Schattschneider, 1975:
66). But these stronger systems of antagon-
2. Depoliticisation re-articulates and re- ism and the invisible conflicts (what might
draws the boundaries of political agency be termed the generally occurring and con-
and possibility in urban politics tingent conditions of the post-political) are
Although there are other ways to think genuinely unstable because they rest on con-
about the relations between political agency flicts between a plurality of political agents.
and (de)politicisation, one approach would
be to consider them as processes in what the 3. The city serves not only as a setting
political scientist Schattschneider (1975)
for depoliticisation but is the very thing at
called ‘the conflict of conflicts’, the broader
contests by which more particular contests stake
appear, and the capacities of political agents Hence in some places depoliticisation might
to engage in this conflict. As a political strat- actually work. And hence the potency of
egy, (de)politicisation might be used by Swyngedouw’s argument that the political is
many actors and not only right-wing neolib- being washed out of the urban fabric. But, in
erals. Such an approach accepts that the other places and times, people are able to
political world is inherently marked by resist or appropriate these post-political
antagonisms and conflicts (Mouffe, 2013). articulations of power (e.g. on German cities
However, only some of them rise to the sur- see Becker et al., 2015). This is still especially
face of the political; that is, they become the case in cities, with their traditions, sym-
public or a matter of public action and delib- bols, and organisation as political spaces.
eration. Most conflicts remain apolitical, Conflicts arise and become visible inside and
that is taken-for-granted and naturalised. outside the political system. This visibility is
(De)politicisation as a political strategy is an crucial for a conflict to become political – it
integral part of managing urban conflicts must be perceived and appreciated as an
and rationalising urban governance. Future open conflict which belongs to the political
research on (de)politicisation should focus sphere. This implies that other people accept
Beveridge and Koch 41

the conflictual claim as legitimate and are depoliticisation or post-politics in cities, this
thus willing to accept as ‘political’ the agency requires both more empirical and ontologi-
associated with it. cal work. This should be a robust and reflex-
Of course cities do not per se facilitate ive engagement, exposing empirically the
politicisation. Researchers have convincingly deficiencies of urban politics and the injus-
argued that spatial practices determine the tices which emerge from it, whilst being
opportunities for political activities. In her more tentative – in ontological terms – of
book ‘Brave New Neighbourhoods’, Kohn how we might recognise politics. This can
(2004) shows that the spatial organisation of certainly involve further engagement with
cities and the corresponding opportunities Rancière, but it might entail setting a lower
for diverse social encounters condition the threshold for what counts as politics or
opportunities for collectivities to organise political agency, for instance following
themselves and to gather public attention Marchart’s notion of ‘minimal politics’ (cf.
for their needs and claims. She deciphers the Purcell, 2014). Ultimately, it might also be
conversion and reframing of public spaces time for the urban depoliticisation debate to
as a tactic or an element in the process of reflect on the plurality of perspectives on
the depoliticisation of cities. So cities as sites what politics is, thinking more not simply
of politicisation require particular spatial about the ontology of urban politics, but the
patterns. The provision of public space, as ontological politics of the urban.
Kohn argues, must go beyond leisure,
recreation and consumption. The public Funding
space is a ‘place for staging polemical scenes, This research received no specific grant from any
a site where the conflict between opposing funding agency in the public, commercial, or not-
interests is made visible and subject of dis- for-profit sectors.
pute’ (Kohn, 2013: 107). Given the centrality
of cities for public contestation, the urban Notes
form is the very thing at stake in (de)politici-
sation. Swyngedouw argues this too but he 1. On differences and similarities between these
writers, see Swyngedouw and Wilson (2014);
assumes a different starting position (that of
cf. Marchart (2011).
a post-political age) where much of the 2. The figures populating the cover of The Post-
potential for political contestation has Political and Its Discontents (Wilson and
already been lost. In line with preceding Swyngedouw, 2014) might be illustrative
assertions, our starting position is one of here.
contingency, that sees the fault lines in, and 3. Conceived as a ‘war of position’, following
not only, the depoliticised urban context. Gramsci.
In sum, we think that Swyngedouw and 4. Larner (2014: 192) adds that Swyngedouw
the post-political thesis he advances is timely (2010: 215) states that he ‘shall begin by
and important because it questions the his- accepting the transformation to a post-
torical relationship between the city and the political and post-democratic configuration
at face value’.
political. Like him, and many other urban
researchers, we share his anxiety and insist
on the – continued – fusion of the urban and References
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