Patrick Geddes and the Anarchist Strain of Town Planning
30th October 4:30 PM – 6:00 PM GMT
Situating Geddes
The Data Civics Observatory is inspired by the work of the sociologist, urban planner, and polymath Patrick Geddes (1854-1932) and his pioneering ideas about the evolution of the city. But how can we situate Geddes intellectually, culturally and politically to give context to this work? In this short series of talks we explore this question by placing Geddes in his cultural-political context and speaking to his enduring relevance to urbanism, civics and ecological thinking today.
About this event
Geddes was part of an international network of radical and revolutionary geographers and communards. His work was both situated within the milieu of late 19th C Anarchism but went on to inspire thinkers such as Giancarlo di Carlo in Italy, Colin Ward in England, and Murray Bookchin in America through the work of Lewis Mumford. This talk explains how these ideas feed into contemporary practices of radical municipalism and ecological urbanism.
Speaker Biographies
Mike Small is a writer and researcher working on a book ‘The Politics of Patrick Geddes’. In 2005 he contributed to Patrick Geddes: By Leaves We Live, jointly published by Edinburgh College of Art and Yamaguchi Institute of Contemporary Art, with text in Japanese and English. He previously taught a course on Patrick Geddes at the Centre for Continuing Education, University of Edinburgh.
Professor Liz McFall is Director of the Data Civics Observatory at Edinburgh Futures Institute and Personal Chair in the Sociology of Markets. She is an interdisciplinary sociologist with research interests that cross the social studies of insurance, cultural economy and market studies. Her recent research explores historical, spatial and infrastructural connections between institutional investment, urban governance and everyday social life. This informs the Data Civics programme which draws inspiration from Patrick Geddes in its emphasis on using digital and experimental ethnographic methods to investigate the social, political, cultural and economic dimensions of civic planning, governance and placemaking.
