Contested port cities: Logistical frictions and civic mobilization in Genoa and Venice

Savoldi, F.

doi:10.1177/23996544241231684

Contested port cities

Title

Contested port cities: Logistical frictions and civic mobilization in Genoa and Venice

Author

Savoldi, F. (TU Delft History, Form & Aesthetics)

Date

2024

Abstract

This article examines the increasingly conflictual relationship between ports and their surrounding communities at a time of wide-reaching infrastructural expansion. It highlights how the centralization of power and logistical gigantism produce deterritorializing frictions, decoupling inhabitants from their territories and creating the conditions for social contestation. It calls for a rethinking of the role of communities in contemporary port-city governance, with an emphasis on imaginaries of re-territorialization produced through social mobilization. I frame the increasing contestation in port cities through a critical approach to logistics, arguing that citizen engagement holds the potential to drastically readdress the port-city relationship. It examines the cases of Genoa and Venice using ethnographic methods and reconstructs a historically in-depth counter-narrative of interactions between port, city and citizen. I contextualize specific frictions between port and city through the rise in social mobilizations. The article shows how social mobilization challenges the status quo in different ways, producing changes and illuminating pathways toward more sustainable forms of coexistence between ports and cities.

Subject

contestation
counter-logistics
frictions
port cities
social mobilisation

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http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:f1e04a82-8256-4a32-8f73-2a2033bf6661

DOI

https://doi.org/10.1177/23996544241231684

ISSN

2399-6544

Source

Environment and Planning C: Politics and Space

Part of collection

Institutional Repository