The geopolitics of real estate: assembling soft power via property markets

Büdenbender, Mirjam; Golubchikov, Oleg

doi:10.1080/14616718.2016.1248646

Cited by 34 publications

(23 citation statements)

References 52 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…Current trends in the Cuban housing economy offer a unique opportunity to study actually existing "market making" processes and practices in a socialist context where private homeownership was historically predominant, but with restrictions for buying, selling, and investing (Grein, 2015). Our findings therefore also dialogue with the literatures on "market making" and "marketization" in general (Boeckler & Berndt, 2012;Corpataux & Crevoisier, 2016;French et al, 2011;Hall, 2010), on real estate in particular (Hofman & Aalbers, 2019;Searle, 2014;Waldron, 2018;Wijburg & Aalbers, 2017), and on situations of emerging market socialism or (post-)socialism more specifically (Bitterer & Heeg, 2012;Bohle, 2014;Büdenbender & Aalbers, 2019;Büdenbender & Golubchikov, 2017). Our findings also sharpen existing debates on financial globalization, uneven development, and dependency theory in an increasingly connected "world of cities" (Brenner & Schmid, 2014;Robinson, 2016).…”

Section: Introductionsupporting

confidence: 84%

Cuban migrants and the making of Havana’s property market

2020

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The emerging literature on the globalization of real estate has addressed how internationally circulating capital has increasingly found its ways into housing markets of the "Global South". With relatively underdeveloped financial and real estate markets, these countries have discursively and materially been rebranded as emerging markets, that is, they have been shaped into frontiers in the global urbanization of capital. In this paper we scrutinize the transnational real estate networks that shape and reshape the Cuban housing market. First, we reconstruct how, following the 2011 legalization of housing prices set between buyers and sellers, Cuban migrants and a few foreign investors, in cooperation with Cubans residing in Cuba, are buying properties in Cuba's cities, beach resorts and other towns. Second, we explore the economic and extra-economic motives behind such transnational property transactions, highlighting how residential properties are bought and converted into private restaurants or hotels. Central to our analysis is that the present development is not simply shaped by local or national demand and processes but also by international investment. We contend that a pattern of economic globalization unfolds where transnational remittances, rather than institutional investments or mortgage finance, steer Cuba's emerging property market, along with local investments among Cuban citizens.

show abstract

Section: Introductionsupporting

confidence: 84%

Cuban migrants and the making of Havana’s property market

2020

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Whilst this is not new, in that the activities of firms and governments have always been intertwined (cf. Büdenbender & Golubchikov, 2017), the growth of powerful SOEs of different types has created new forms of dependency for territorial governments intent on the expansion of supply, especially in housing provision. This dependency has the potential to circumscribe the degree of criticism that authorities are likely to make of governments in investment-rich source countries, as there is pressure to create 'geopolitically welcoming' environments for investors, alongside more traditional policy instruments to boost their financial and economic returns.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…What such evidence demonstrates is that, in Büdenbender and Golubchikov's (2017) terms, there needs to be a greater awareness that geopolitics is more than just a 'context in which business is conducted' and should be seen as a 'process that may well involve real estate itself as one of its ingredients' (p. 77). Drawing on the example of the relationships between US real estate companies and Russian property markets, they argue that geopolitics is not 'merely conditioning, but also conditioned by, real estate production and circulation'.…”

Section: The Territorial Trap and The Rise Of Relational Regulationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Relational regulation and Chinese real estate investment in London: moving beyond the territorial trap

Raco

Sun

Brill

2020

Territory, Politics, Governance

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

National governments, urban authorities and supra-national bodies increasingly see the provision of new housing as a core priority. There has been a strong emphasis on reforming the regulatory environments that exist within geographical territories and making them more welcoming to inward investment. However, such outlooks we claim often fall into a territorial trap and give too much prominence to the regulations and policy environments found in recipient destinations. The paper argues instead for a more recursive focus on the ways in which decisions taken in 'source' and 'host' locations need to be understood as part of a mutually constitutive system of governance. Using the example of Chinese residential investment into London, it argues that investment trends, processes and outcomes reflect a recursive combination of regulatory and political changes in both the city and within China, with the latter becoming increasingly influential. As we show, the Chinese Communist Party has been exerting greater control over the activities of Chinese real estate enterprises and what products are 'permitted' for investment and how this should be done. The paper reflects on the implications for recent academic and policy writings on urban territorial competition.

show abstract

“…Monotowns are typically discussed within a national political framework and are marginal in debates on postsocialist urban developments. How global (capitalist) practices have manifested in post-socialist cities has been studied mostly by looking at developments in metropolises, emphasizing for example the internationalization of real estate, gentrification, and the commodification of urban space (Büdenbender and Golubchikov 2017;Badyina and Golubchikov 2005;Golubchikov and Phelps 2011). A "deepened neoliberal urbanization" (Büdenbender and Zupan 2017, 309) has been observed across these cities however, linking post-socialist urban change to global urban trends about making cities attractive and globally competitive -and also to a changing global landscape of uneven geographies of development and associated issues of urban inequality and insecurity (Sassen 1991(Sassen , 2014Curtis 2016).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Multiscalar entanglements in the post-socialist city: monotown restructuring, spatial re-ordering and urban inequality in Russia

Stuvøy

Shirobokova

2021

Eurasian Geography and Economics

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Monotowns in Russia epitomize the mixed history of Soviet industrialized urbanization and post-soviet transformation. The 2007-8 global financial crisis magnified socio-economic problems in these cities. In spite of the deepened neoliberal urbanization observed across post-socialist cities and the global impetus of the crisis, monotowns were typically discussed within a national political framework. Our point of departure is that the monotown is an instructive site in which to explore the conundrum of global-local interconnections. To develop this argument, we conceptualize multiscalar entanglements as a base to combine analytical attention to subjective narratives with an interest in (global) structuring forces. We use this to empirically examine logics of spatial re-ordering in Russian monotowns in two analytical steps: First, we observe how federal policy introduced in response to the global crisis redefined monotowns from being territories of "crisis" and "risk" into those that offered spaces of development. Second, we focus on a particular study-site, the city of Zapolyarny and explain how the city-forming enterprise has initiated a reconstruction of the city. We find that the enterprise has reemerged as an urban governing body. In conclusion, we draw attention to emerging trends in urban inequality and insecurity constituted by these logics of spatial reordering.

show abstract

The geopolitics of real estate: assembling soft power via property markets

Cited by 34 publications

References 52 publications

Cuban migrants and the making of Havana’s property market

Cuban migrants and the making of Havana’s property market

Relational regulation and Chinese real estate investment in London: moving beyond the territorial trap

Multiscalar entanglements in the post-socialist city: monotown restructuring, spatial re-ordering and urban inequality in Russia

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About