Reminder of Call for Papers: American Association of Geographers (AAG) Annual Meeting, 21-25 April 2015, Chicago
Session Title: 'Financing and Governing Infrastructure'
Organisers: Phil O'Neill (University of Western Sydney, Australia) and Andy Pike (Newcastle University, UK)
Sponsorship: Economic Geography Speciality Group
Outline
Infrastructure procurement and financing continue to undergo major transformation across the globe. In the developed nations, utility structures have been eroded or sold-off; and with deteriorating fiscal capacity, public sector-led infrastructure development is severely constrained. Yet demand continues for new infrastructure and for maintenance of existing assets. In response, national, sub-national and local governments experiment with adapted and innovative financing tools and practices, albeit with new risks and without reproducible success stories.
What is evident, however, is the increasing participation of private actors and capital in infrastructure provision, the emergence of infrastructure as an asset class, the increasing influence of financial markets, and of their processes and intermediaries, and the emergence of financing mechanisms that meld novel design and the latest financial technologies to channel investment across the regional, local and urban landscape. Two powerful market forces are in play. One is the heightened competition among banks, funds and asset managers for the delivery of finance. The other is competition by a range of private players for control over infrastructure's valuable revenue streams.
Within this mix, government institutions at a range of scales, including city and local authorities, are pressured to take on heightened financial risk, which, in turn, shapes the design and governance of infrastructure provision in particular, and budgetary strategies and public service delivery models more generally. Then there is a related set of questions about the long-term ownership and control of urban infrastructure, especially with the emergence of global infrastructure companies specialising in asset management and service delivery, including in the sensitive areas of water and energy.
The aim of this session is to identify and understand the changing patterns and modes of infrastructure procurement, financing, operation and governance. We encourage the offers of papers that connect with and provide conceptual, methodological, empirical and political insights into the following:
. Infrastructure financing and the emergence of infrastructure as a new asset class.
. Market competition for infrastructure assets and operation.
. The urban context of private infrastructure provision within the frame of speculative and entrepreneurial urbanism.
. The context of austerity urbanism and fiscal stress.
. The deployment of infrastructure as a tool for post-crisis local and regional development.
. Infrastructure privatisation as a marker of state restructuring including at the scale of the nation state, the city and municipality.
. The implications for metropolitan governance, infrastructure planning and delivery.
If you are interested in presenting a paper, please send a title and an abstract of around 250 words to Phil O'Neill ([log in to unmask]) and Andy Pike ([log in to unmask]) by Monday 6 October 2014.
Kind regards
Dr Peter O'Brien
Research Associate
Centre for Urban and Regional Development Studies (CURDS)
Newcastle University
Newcastle upon Tyne
NE1 7RU, UK
tel: +44 (0) 191 208 3255
email: [log in to unmask]
View my profile Visit the CURDS website Read the CURDS blog Follow us on twitter
|