Re-City Conference 2025 - Urban Democracy and Radical Care

Theme 01 explores urban care as a concept and a value. The focus is on feminist and relational ethics of care and care-full cities, but also other related theories and concepts can be discussed. Further, we are interested in what makes care a radical approach and practice in current urban environments. While the emphasis is on theoretical conceptualizations, we welcome also illustrative cases and examples of how care unfolds in cities, and how urban care has been represented, for instance, in arts and literature.

• Theoretical and conceptual approaches: What does care for the city mean? What is the relation between care and other key concepts of urban research such as justice, democracy, and responsibility? 
• Ethics of care: How and where is care ethics present (or not) in cities? What is the role of care-related qualities such as empathy, compassion, and nurturance in urban context? 
• Radical care: What does radicalness of care mean in particular? Do we need new conceptualizations and practices of radical care in cities? What is the critical side of care?
• Posthuman urban care: What is the role of non-humans (e.g. AI, robots, animals, other species) in urban care?   
• Urban care in arts: How is urban care represented in the arts such as visual arts, literature, and theater? Artistic contributions are also welcome. 

Theme 02 explores what happens to care in urban transformation and whether urban change can happen in a caring manner. This theme is related as much to the social, built, and ecological environments in cities by focusing especially on people, buildings, and ecosystems whose well-being or existence are threatened by either too rapid or too absent city development. On the other hand, we are interested to hear how care and caring relations can be enhanced in urban planning and management, and what kinds of radical measures cities or urban residents have adopted to build more care-full cities of the future. 

• Urban planning and management: How do urban planning and management cover the issues of urban care? What kinds of strategic or practical measures have been adopted to enhance more sustainable and caring cities, and what obstacles such measures face in current urban planning practices? 
• Urban regeneration and change: Can urban change be made in a caring manner, or does it lead to gentrification, housing violence, biodiversity loss, or other urban problems and challenges? How can these problems be prevented? 
• Public spaces: What is the role of urban public spaces in care-full cities? How can public spaces be designed in a way that makes them more inclusive and caring, especially for people in marginalized positions? 
• Building preservation and conservation: Building are protected for their use value and cultural heritage, but could they also be renovated or recycled for environmental reasons? How can we take better care of our buildings and the built environment? 
• Urban nature: What kind of threats does urban transformation pose to urban nature and biodiversity? What efforts have been made to protect, preserve, and promote biodiversity in cities? 

Theme 03 explores social and spatial justice in relation to care. The focus is on urban inequalities and vulnerabilities, the urban spaces of care, formal and informal care, the institutions of care, and the effects of care practices on social sustainability. Also, critical notions on power relations are welcome, as well as discussions on how justice, law, and care are related to each other in urban contexts.

• Justice, rights, and law: How are justice, rights, law, and care related to each other in the everyday life of cities? How do formal and informal laws govern care practices, and how do these practices re-formulate laws and the conceptions of urban justice?   
• Inequalities and vulnerabilities: What kinds of inequalities and vulnerabilities are involved in the transformation of urban environments? How are timely challenges such as housing precarity, mobility, and ageing population approached in care practices? What kinds of invisible inequalities can be identified in cities? 
• Spaces and places: How are urban spaces and places of care constituted, and how can they be advanced? How is care practiced and distributed in urban public spaces and in everyday urban interactions? 
• Formal and informal: How are the formal and informal actions of care related to each other, and how do they renew the conception of care? Who are urban care-givers, where do they work, and what do they do? Is there place for radical care in care institutions?   
• Power, care, and control: How to think, conceptualize, and recognize misuse and carceral practices in care? How are power relations linked with carceralities and injustices, and how have power relations been criticized and questioned? 

Theme 04 explores the (radical) practices and methods of how care can be enhanced in cities through urban politics and action. The focus is on urban politics and democracy in a wider sense, understanding them as activities that people or organizations adopt to make impact in the society or everyday life. We are also interested in what researchers, teachers, and artists can do to take better care of the cities through participatory and creative methods.  

• Urban democracy and politics: What kind of political questions are related to urban care and democracy? How does democratic deficit affect urban care? 
• Citizen participation and care: How can citizens become caregivers of their cities? What kinds of DIY care practices there exist and what is their relation to urban democracy? 
• Education: How can urban care be considered in education and pedagogics? What is role of schools or teachers in promoting care-full cities? 
• Participatory action research: How have researchers taken part in urban care? What kind of participatory or creative research methods have been employed in this field? 
• Artistic practices and creativity: What kind of artistic or creative interventions there have been related to urban care and democracy? Artistic contributions are also welcome.