Extended urbanisation and the politics of uncertainty: The contested pathways of highway corridors in India
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Date
2024-03
Publication Type
Journal Article
ETH Bibliography
yes
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Abstract
This paper explores how uncertainty has become a central constitutive feature under the ongoing attempts at rapid extension of highway corridors across India. Contrary to the terra nullius assumption that India's highway programmes operate under, the pathways to accumulation they seek to open present a palimpsest of pre-existing claims, occupancies and forms of dwelling that come into conflict with the attempts to extend urban space. The paper specifically follows the prolonged uncertainty surrounding a regional highway corridor between the cities of Delhi and Gurgaon, the Dwarka Expressway, which underwent multiple legal contestations over evictions and land disputes. In doing so, it analyses how managing uncertainty in the production of highway corridors becomes profitable for the state, powerful corporate actors and middle-class homebuyer-investors, presenting a form of value that can be commodified and exchanged. However, on the other hand, owing to its double-edged nature, uncertainty also becomes productive for the urban majority in laying claims to urban space. As rapid extended urbanisation increasingly disrupts the lifeworlds of marginal communities, this paper calls for embracing the politics and practices of uncertainty in the continued efforts to push ex-centric urban analysis beyond the narrow focus on state processes and commodification.
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Publication status
published
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Book title
Journal / series
Volume
190 (1)
Pages / Article No.
Publisher
Wiley
Event
Edition / version
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Software
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Date collected
Date created
Subject
critical ethnography; Delhi region; extended urbanization; gated communities; highway corridors; infrastructure
Organisational unit
08810 - Schmid, Christian (Tit.-Prof.)
02655 - Netzwerk Stadt u. Landschaft ARCH u BAUG / Network City and Landscape ARCH and BAUG
08058 - Singapore-ETH Centre (SEC) / Singapore-ETH Centre (SEC)
08060 - FCL / FCL