Urban Politics in the Global South
November 14-15, 2024
We are pleased to announce the 2024 Urban Politics in the Global South conference on November 14-15, 2024. The conference will be fully virtual. This third annual conference brings together the growing community of social scientists conducting research on urban politics in low- and middle-income countries in different world regions. We seek to facilitate exchange among scholars within political science, related disciplines, and practitioners.
The 2024 Urban Politics in the Global South conference will feature an opening panel entitled, “Building Resilient Local Democracies,” which will invite policymakers, officials, and other actors working in cities in the Global South to discuss the challenges and opportunities they face in fostering democratic participation and competition at the local level.
To capture the array of exciting work currently being conducted in the field, the conference will also include two types of research discussion, namely lightning talks (7-minute presentations) and discussions of full-length papers (15- minute presentations).
2024 Program
All times in Eastern Standard Time
Thursday, November 14
12:00-1:00 PM Opening panel
Participants: Bettina Romero and Alhassan Ibn Abdallah
Moderator: Noah Nathan
1:00-1:50 Lightning talk panel 1
Ying Gao (J-PAL) – Participatory Development and Political Leaders in Urban Informal Settlements: Evidence from Indonesia's National Slum Upgrading Project
Sarah Daniel (UC Berkeley) – Spaces of Change: How the Built Environment Shapes Political Engagement and Elite Interactions in Urban East Africa
Jared Kalow (MIT) – Roving Clients, Stationary Patrons: Urban Mobility and Formalization of Political Participation in Clientelist Democracies
Veronica Hurtado (UAI) – Organized Crime and Political Participation: How does Extortion Shape Turnout and Protests Participation in Chile?
Discussant: Jeffrey Paller
Moderator: Tanu Kumar
1:50-2:00 Break
2:00-3:00 Paper discussion 1
Paige Bollen (Ohio State University) – The Spatial Ties that Bind: Spatial Capital and Collective Action in Urban Ghana
Manuela Muñoz (Texas Tech University) – Green Neighborhoods for Everyone? Hyper-Local Governance Institutions, Geographic Representation and Urban Public Goods
Discussant: Adam Auerbach
Moderator: Tanu Kumar
Friday, November 15
12:00-1:00 PM Paper discussion 2
José Pérez (Ohio State University) – Street-level Bureaucrats and Venezuelan Migration to Brazil: Governmentality, Agency, and State Transformation
Irene Farah (University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign) – Street Vending Inspectors as Brokers: Public Administration and the Politics of Public Space in Mexico City
Discussant: Veronica Herrera
Moderator: Noah Nathan
1:00-1:50 PM Lightning talk panel 2
Anustubh Agnihotri (Ashoka University) – Citizen-State Linkages in Urban and Rural India: Evidence from Aadhaar PDS Linkage
Lucas Borba (Vanderbilt University) – The Spatial Dynamics of Enforcement: How Socioeconomic Segregation Influences Institutional Weakness
Hakeem Bishi (Concordia University, Montreal) – Concessions, contestation, and cooperation: Indigenous landowner choices and urban development patterns in Lagos, Nigeria
Discussant: Alison Post
Moderator: Noah Nathan
1:50-2:00 PM Break
2:00-3:00 PM Paper discussion 3
Isabella Montini (University of California, Berkeley) – Pork Politics and City Size: Evidence from Brazil
Anjali Thomas (Georgia Institute of Technology) – Getting on the Grid: A Field Experiment on Bottom-Up Political Pressure and Access to Essential Public Services
Discussant: Tanu Kumar and Alicia Cooperman
Moderator: Noah Nathan
2024 Conference Co-Chairs: Alicia Cooperman, Tanu Kumar, Noah Nathan
Conference Steering Committee:
Header photo: Adam Auerbach