Cities, Participation and Institutional Innovation: Towards alternative models of urban governance?

Dear colleagues, 

 

We kindly invite you to join our Special Issue proposal, currently under submission to the European Journal of Spatial Development (EJSD), put forward by Erblin Berisha (Politecnico di Torino), Raffaella Coletti (CNR ISTeG), Andrea Simone (Università di Palermo) and Fabrizio Tuzi (CNR ISTeG). The SI is dedicated to Cities, Participation and Institutional Innovation: Towards alternative models of urban governance. 

 

 

Cities and metropolitan areas are increasingly marked by widening inequalities and territorial polarisation, with uneven access to basic services such as housing, healthcare and education. It is becoming increasingly clear that public actors cannot tackle these polarisation dynamics on their own. They tend to respond by implementing integrated strategies and forging alliances and partnerships with other local stakeholders. In this process, the urban and metropolitan scale has emerged as a central arena of multilevel governance, where cities act not merely as administrative units but as political actors and laboratories of institutional innovation. We invite contributions exploring experiences of horizontal governance and public-private partnerships at the urban or metropolitan scale, whether emerging from local initiatives or shaped by national and European policy frameworks (from cohesion policy to recovery funds). The Special Issue examines how such initiatives can help tackle growing inequalities and what institutional innovations cities might put forward to respond more effectively to the profound economic, social and environmental changes currently underway. In doing so, it pays specific attention to the geographical and institutional dimension of these processes, asking under what territorial conditions they take place and with what territorial implications.

 

Topics include (but are not limited to) housing, migration, environmental degradation, food security, social infrastructures, cultural heritage, cohesion policy and the management of public funds. Contributions may focus on a single city or adopt a comparative perspective. We are interested in case studies, particularly from across Europe.

Please send your abstract by 10 October 2026 to: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

 

We look forward to your contributions and remain at your disposal for additional information