Key note sassen icvc 2012
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BENEATH THE HATREDS AND RACISMS…STRUCTURAL CONVERGENCE Saskia Sassen Columbia University Integrating Cities 2012 Amsterdam
Transcript of Key note sassen icvc 2012
BENEATH THE HATREDS AND RACISMS…STRUCTURAL CONVERGENCE
Saskia Sassen Columbia University Integrating Cities 2012 Amsterdam
Unstable Meanings
Structural approximation beneath ideological and political distance
Two emergent cross-border spaces:
The security apparatus and we the citizens (the new colonials?)
Inequality and expulsions
The making of histories
An analysis that seeks to recover how a condition, a system, a subject, were made.
The diverse elements that got assembled to make that condition or that subject.
. Analytic Tactics
Destabilizing stable meanings
In the shadows of powerful explanations
When territory exits conventional framings:
it becomes institutionally mobile, nomadic and can alter the meaning of nation-state membership: Today’s large diverse cities
MULTIPLE IMMIGRATION SPACES
The spaces (institutional, ideational, tactical) for producing the migrant subject can be very diverse - the new transnational class of professionals - the contract-labor worker entering for seasonal work under specific short-term conditions - the business-visa immigrant - the family-dependent immigrant - the green card immigrant - the high-tech visa worker
Billions
of dollars
Billions
of dollars
1. India 21.7 11. Serbia 4.1
2. China 21.3 12. Pakistan 3.9
3. Mexico 18.1 13. Brazil 3.6
4. France 12.7 14. Bangladesh 3.4
5. Philippines 11.6 15. Egypt, Arab Rep. 3.3
6. Spain 6.9 16. Portugal 3.2
7. Belgium 6.8 17. Vietnam 3.2
8. Germany 6.5 18. Colombia 3.2
9. United Kingdom 6.4 19. United States 3
10. Morocco 4.2 20. Nigeria 2.8
Source: Author’s Calculations Based on IMF BoP Yearbook, 2004, and World Bank Staff estimates.
Top 20 remittance-recipient countries, 2006 (US$ billions)
Security regimes
1,271 government organizations and 1,931 private companies work on programs related to counterterrorism, homeland security and intelligence in about 10,000 locations across the US
An estimated 854,000 people – nearly 1.5 times as many people as live in Washington, D.C. – hold top-secret security clearances
.
Of the estimated 265,000 private companies doing intelligence work, 1,931 do work at the top-secret level.
Out of 854,000 people with top-secret clearance, an estimated 265,000 are private contractors
MAP OF GOVERNMENT AND PRIVATE SECURITY AGENCIES IN THE US
Source: Washington Post. 2010. “Top Secret America,” Interactive Maps. Washington Post, July 2010. http://projects.washingtonpost.com/top-secret-america/map/
MAP OF COUNTER-TERRORISM ORGANIZATIONS IN THE US
Source: Washington Post. 2010. “Top Secret America,” Interactive Maps. Washington Post, July 2010. http://projects.washingtonpost.com/top-secret-america/map/
INEQUALITY IS MADE
The aims of economic systems can vary greatly
The modes in which governments regulate economies
Income % of top 10% earners 1917-2005
*Income is defined as market income but excludes capital gains Source: Mishel, L. 2004. “Unfettered Markets, Income Inequality, and Religious Values.” Viewpoints. May 19, 2004.
Economic Policy Institute. Retrieved July 26, 2008 [
www.epi.org/content.cfm/webfeatures_viewpoints_moral_markets_presentation.]
% Growth in After-Tax Income, USA 1979-2007
Who are the top 1% and the rest--2010
Income: wages, gov transfers, capital gains, dividends, other investment income, etc.
Top 1% of US households had a mininum income of $516,633
Bottom 60% earned a max of $59,154
bottom 40 %: max of $33,870
bottom 20%: max of $16,961.
See http://taxpolicycenter.org/numbers/displayatab.cfm?Docid=3047
Expulsions: Foreclosures
2006 : 1.2 million foreclosures, up 42% from 2005. This is: One in every 92 U.S. households
2007: 2.2 million forecls, up 75% from 06
2008: 3.1 million, up 81% from 07
2009: 3.9 million (or 1 in 45 US hholds)
(From 2007 to 2009: 120% increase in forecls)
2010: 2.9 mill forecls. (2006-2010: total 14.2 mil)
Source: RealtyTrac 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010; Blomquist 2011
DEAD CITIES
In the shadows of “urbanization” In all the talk about the growth of urban
populations there is never mention of what processes are feeding this growth.
One set of processes consists of expulsions –of people from their land due to “landgrabs” or mining.
Where do they go? To cities, where they will add to the homeless and to the slums.
One instance
From 2006 to 2010: 70million hectares of land in Afri ,LatAm, Cambodia, Ukraine bought/leased by rich govts,firms,fin firms
The land is now more valued than the people or activities on it
The active making of surplus populations
Novel assemblages of Territory/Authority/Rights
