Description

Speculative property bubble has become a lived experience of many urbanites in the global South and in particular, East Asia that experienced condensed urbanisation under strong states. East Asian economies have been paying a committed attention to property development, aiming to maximise rent extraction through commodification of space and yet resulting in gentrification, domicide and dispossession. Mega-projects are launched to produce brand new towns sometimes labelled as eco- or smart cities, despite the reality that these projects usually turn out to be nothing more than real estate speculation. The urbanisation experience is negatively shared by indigenous populations whose dwellings and farmlands for survival are destructed to make ways for new real estate investments. Given the substantial impact on the built environment and especially the existing residential landscape, the contemporary speculative urbanisation in East Asia or the global East, and to a large extent in other economies increasingly subject to planetary urbanisation, witnesses harmful concentration of resources in fixed assets, especially the real estate sector, creating housing poverty of affluence.

Keynote Speech by Hyun Bang Shin, Associate Professor, Geography and Urban Studies, London School of Economics and Political Science
“The Political Economy of Speculative Urbanisation in East Asia”

Hyun Bang Shin is Associate Professor of Geography and Urban Studies at London School of Economics and Political Science. His research centres on the critical analysis of the political economic dynamics of speculative urbanisation, the politics of redevelopment and displacement, gentrification, housing, the right to the city, and mega-events as urban spectacles, with particular attention to Asian cities. His publications include an edited volume Global Gentrifications: Uneven Development and Displacement (Policy Press, 2015) and a monograph Planetary Gentrification (Polity Press, 2016). His on-going book projects include a monograph Making China Urban (Routledge), and a co-edited volume Contesting Urban Space in East Asia (Palgrave Macmillan).

Panelists:
Laam Hae, Associate Professor, Political Science, York University
The “Construction State” Unbounded: Variegated Neoliberal Urbanization and Struggles over Greenbelt Deregulation in the Seoul Metropolitan Region
Jesook Song, Professor, Anthropology, Interim Director of the Centre for the Study of Korea, University of Toronto
Dialogue of “Asia as Method” and Urban Studies: Hyunjang (Core-Location) and Social Humanities
Hae Yeon Choo, Assistant Professor, Sociology, University of Toronto
Speculative Self-making: Class Mobility, Homeownership, and Real Estate Investment in South Korea