The Changing Italian Cities – Call for Abstracts
THE CHANGING ITALIAN CITIES: EMERGING IMBALANCES AND CONFLICTS
L’Aquila, December 10 and11, 2013 – Gran Sasso Science Institute (L’Aquila)
(Abstracts submission deadline: October 27, 2013)
Under the pressure of economic, demographic, institutional and cultural changes Italian cities are experiencing profound structural transformations. The heterogeneity of the Italian urban system – highly polycentric and characterized by a very large number of small- and medium-sized cities – makes the ‘process of structural change’ highly place-specific. The ‘structure’ (and size) of the Italian cities – their resistance and resilience capacity – and the shocks hitting them are different city by city and, consequently, their evolutionary trajectories may be expected to be very different too.
There is a general lack of knowledge – in particular knowledge that can be used for a comparative analysis – on the current state and potential development trajectories of the Italian cities. The seminar – which will be the first of a series on this theme planned at the Gran Sasso Science Institute – will contribute to a better understanding of the state of the Italian cities. It will explore the recent evolution of Italian urban system from an interdisciplinary perspective with the aim of discovering the emerging imbalances and conflicts associated to the current structural changes. In this first workshop the focus will be on empirical investigations and field studies in an attempt to highlight the emerging imbalances and the ensuing conflicts that characterize Italian cities in this historical phase.
Scientific Committee: Antonio Calafati (Gran Sasso Science Institute), Francesco Chiodelli (Gran Sasso Science Institute), Marco Cremaschi (Roma Tre University)
