Beleaguered City, Beleaguered Planet

Abstract

This article sets out to analyze the connections between three different but related phenomena (capitalist globalization, the Anthropocene, and the coronavirus epidemic) through the lens of iconic buildings and spaces and the cities in which they are mostly found. I argue that the transnational capitalist class uses cities as competitors in a global system of lucrative investment opportunities. Capitalist globalization is widely implicated in the Anthropocene (signifying human impacts on the Earth system, usually destructive) and together they facilitate the spread of the coronavirus. The concept of “administrative evil” is mobilized to highlight the ethical dimensions of city planning, and the increasingly “beleaguered city.”