REP Research Seminar - Presenting in person - Professor Stefano Moroni, from the Polytechnic University of Milan, Italy. Title: "Spatial justice: A fundamental or derivative notion?"

This is an internal seminar and attendees should use their University email account to join the meeting if they are joining via MS Teams. You are welcome to share this invite internally but please do not share it beyond the University. Please direct any enquiries from those outside of the University to: repschooloffice@reading.ac.uk.

Bio:

Stefano Moroni is Professor in Planning at Milan Polytechnic (Department of Architecture and Urban Studies). He teaches "Land use ethics and the law" and "Planning Theories". He is a member of the editorial board of "Planning Theory". He works on planning theory and on ethical and legal issues. Recent publications: (with G. Brunetta), Contractual Communities in the Self-Organizing City: Freedom, Cooperation, Subsidiarity, Springer, 2013; (with C. Basta), Ethics, Design and Planning of the Built Environment, Springer, 2014; (with D. Andersson), Cities and Private Planning: Property Rights, Entrepreneurship and Transaction Costs, Edward Elgar, 2014; (with D. Weberman), Space and Pluralism. Can Contemporary Cities Be Places of Tolerance? CEU, 2016.

Abstract:

The concept of “spatial justice” is widely employed in the contemporary academic literature and public debates. This concept is usually deemed decisive for a radical change in urban policies and planning. However, there is no agreed definition of what spatial justice is. This happens also because the idea, despite obtaining immediate and extensive success, still lacks some necessary conceptual and analytical explorations and clarifications. The presentation critically revisits the idea itself of “spatial justice”. To do so, it makes three preliminary specifications in regard to: the primary subject of justice; the distinction between the general concept of justice and specific substantive conceptions of justice; the circumscribed meaning of the notion of distributive justice as a mere component of the more general notion of social justice. Further specifications follow on the issue of “space” itself. Against this background, the presentation discusses five cases in which space is effectively involved in justice issues: as an influencing factor; as a unit of allocation; as a privately owned asset; as a public domain; as a precinct. The conclusions suggest that the notion of spatial justice is “derivative” rather than “foundational”.