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Just a minor correction below, the time is 8 am ET, not EST.. On Sat, May 21, 2022 at 2:12 PM Preeti Sampat <[log in to unmask]> wrote: > Dear All, > > Hope this finds you well and sorry for any cross postings. A quick > reminder regarding the upcoming seminar on rent. Please find the details > below and join us if your schedules permit. > > Best wishes, > Preeti > > > SEMINAR > > The Rent Relation and Struggles over Distribution in the 21st Century > > May 25 2022 8-10:30 am ET / 1-3:30pm GMT / 2-4:30pm SAST / 5:30pm-8:00pm > IST > > Zoom Registration Link: Seminar on Rent > <https://zoom.us/meeting/register/tJEpf-Goqz4jHdai5VI14YPPhg4FaZMkm_RY> > > Rent shapes the millennial geography of struggles over land and its more > than human affordances. Rent emerges as an attribute of private property > entitlements that are pivotal to capital. Appropriated in the moment of > distribution, rent is nevertheless fundamental to coordinating the flows of > value through the moments of production, circulation and consumption. > Assetization of land and its affordances enables the appropriation of rent > through wide-ranging investments in real estate, infrastructure, > agriculture and extractive industry, in turn impacting access to housing, > livelihoods, food security and multispecies life. State agencies across the > world are instrumental to facilitating these investments through direct > consolidation of land, or through enabling legal frameworks. How do we > understand the growing role of rent in millennial capitalist accumulation? > Is there a fundamental contradiction between the moment of production and > the moment of distribution that the rent relation engenders and must > contain for ongoing accumulation? Are rentier appropriations new, or how > are they specific to this historical conjuncture of accumulation? How do > they unleash speculative spirals, financial crises, ghost cities and failed > infrastructure projects across variegated contexts? What is their role in > reinforcing inequalities (or enabling contingent solidarities) along race, > caste, class, gender, ethnicity and other power differences? What lessons > do contemporary struggles against dispossession, over land, housing, > livelihoods, food security and multi-species life hold, for understanding > the geography of rent? This seminar addresses some preliminary questions > around the millennial geography of rent and accumulation. > > Speakers > > Erik Swyngedouw (University of Manchester), Moderator > > “The Shitty Business of Rent”: An introduction > > The Marxist and post-marxist analysis of the rent question has plagued > political-economic and political-ecological analysis for a long time. No > wonder Marx referred to it as ‘the shitty business of rent’. In this > introduction, I will chart the contours of the rent problematic, the > central place it takes in contemporary political-economic and > political-ecological relations, and focus on the social struggles that > unfold around the rent nexus. I will then introduce the speakers in the > seminar. > > Manuel Aalbers (KU Leuven) > > Land rent and wealth-driven housing dynamics > > Land rent drives inequality. This has always been the case, but in this > presentation I will look into one new and one not so new way in which this > is the case. The new way is that short-term rentals, enabled through > digital platforms such as airbnb, drive up rents and tenant displacement. > This is enabled through ‘tourism rent’, which mixes elements of the > classical forms of rent. The not so new way is that the finance-driven > house price increases have led to wealth-driven home and buy-to-let > purchases. Of course, wealth has always driven house and rental prices, but > the exact way in which this happens in the (post-)debt period has shifted. > > Callum Ward (London School of Economics; with Frances Brill, University > of Cambridge) > > How to Make a City into a Firetrap: Relations of Land and Property in the > UK’s Cladding Scandal > > In the aftermath of the 2017 Grenfell fire it was found that buildings > across the UK were covered in flammable cladding and had other structural > safety issues. Assumed liable for remedial costs that in many cases have > not been assessed, many leaseholders have found themselves stuck in > uninsurable, and therefore unsellable, potentially fire-prone units. In > this paper, we analyse how the property relations between leaseholder and > freeholder within a neoliberal context dominated by extractive rentiers has > created this situation. We trace the relationship between the structure of > landed property, financialised value-extraction, and socio-materialities of > the built environment to understand how Britain’s system of housing > provision has turned sections of the UK property market into literal > fire-traps. In doing so, we point to a need to understand the > institutionalised chain of rent-seekers ‘value grabbing’ if we are to > understand social murder through unsafe housing conditions. > > Preeti Sampat (Ambedkar University Delhi) > > The Caste of Rent > > Rent is often discussed as a secular distribution relation in the > accumulation cycle. As an attribute of propertized land however, it is > fundamentally tied to historical social relations of colonialism, race, > ethnicity, gender, religion and in the case of India, caste. These > relations mediate the ownership of land and its affordances, including real > estate and rent. With an ethnographic vignette from the upcoming > ‘greenfield’ Dholera smart city in Gujarat, India, I discuss the caste > relations of rent through propertized land. Dholera indexes the > contradictions of accumulation in India’s economic growth at several > registers; and fosters contingent solidarities across historical > inequalities among those resisting the project. > > Kai Bosworth (Virginia Commonwealth University) > > Comparative and differential rents in agriculture and oil transportation: > Revisiting the spatial contradictions of capital > > The extraction of rents is a comparative and differential exercise. The > contradiction in space that can be found in the oil industry, Mazan Labban > (2008) has influentially argued, stems from the difference in access and > control faced by landed and circulating capital. Though this contradiction > could be emblematic of broader trends in the relationship between finance, > extraction, and logistics/infrastructure (Mezzadra and Neilson 2019, > Arboleda 2020), this talk focuses on a smaller but no less emblematic > dimension: the comparative exercise that agricultural landowners undertake > when evaluating pipeline easements. Landowners' understandings of the > profit they can extract from space is mediated by rent, but evaluation of > rent enfolds a complicated material ecology: winter wheat, ground heat, > insect hatching times, clay byproducts, and topsoil layers. As a mediating > force, rent can thus either exacerbate or resolve this spatial > contradiction, albeit only temporarily. > > Alex Loftus (King's College London) > > Value-rent-finance in the financialization of water infrastructure > > Building on Purcell et al (2020), I will explore the internal relations > between value, rent, and finance as a way of interpreting the process often > referred to as financialization. Crucially, by viewing value, rent, and > finance as internally related, it becomes possible to develop conversations > between Marxist critiques of capitalism and the environment, and more > recent work on the financialization of nature. I will then go on to apply > this framework to an interpretation of financialized water provision in > London, and the construction of major new infrastructure projects on the > River Thames. > > > -- > Dr. Preeti Sampat > USF International Fellow > <https://www.urbanstudiesfoundation.org/funding/grantees/dr-preeti-sampat/> > Assistant Professor in Sociology > <https://aud.ac.in/faculty/dr-preeti-sampat> > School of Liberal Studies > Dr. B. R. Ambedkar University Delhi > > -- Dr. Preeti Sampat USF International Fellow <https://www.urbanstudiesfoundation.org/funding/grantees/dr-preeti-sampat/> Assistant Professor in Sociology <https://aud.ac.in/faculty/dr-preeti-sampat> School of Liberal Studies Dr. B. R. Ambedkar University Delhi _______________________________________________________ [log in to unmask] An urban geography discussion and announcement forum List Archives: http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/URB-GEOG-FORUM Maintained by: RGS-IBG Urban Geography Research Group UGRG Home Page: http://www.urban-geography.org.uk