Riding roughshod over people. Reading politics, economy and civil society in metropolization. A case study in Rome

Over the last two-three decades the political, economic, spatial and social characteristics of urban development mirror several important transformations driven by both global and site-specific factors. These transformations can be defined in terms of an ongoing process of metropolization, that is, an increasing concentration of technological and research-intensive industries as well as knowledge-intensive services in metropolitan regions and large cities. In spatial terms, this process concerns the geography of urban space, implying a spatial distribution and polarization of functions, which in turn relates to infrastructures concerned with metropolitan connectivity. This often produces polycentric spatial patterns of demographic settlement and economic activity within urban agglomerations. Polycentricism refers to the morphology of the functional, social, cultural, and spatial composition of urban areas. Conventionally, a polycentric metropolitan area consists of one central city and a set of smaller sub-centres, which have a high degree of integration with the nucleus. Our interest resides in understanding: who drives these metropolization dynamics, and how, and, above all, in whose interests? Moreover, we inquiry what is the role of politics in this process? More specifically: what is the role of local government? And what we can say about the involvement of civil society? Are economic actors the key players in urban development? What kind of economic actors can actually play a strategic role in metropolization? What are the relationships between the different actors involved in the governing and governance of metropolitan development? In order to answer these questions we reconstruct and analyze a case study in Rome regarding a central urban area, interpreted as a main ‘pole’ of a planned new polycentric urban structure, where the redevelopment of a railway station led to a wider transformation and urban regeneration process, mainly aimed at promoting metropolization. A major European bank chose this location for its headquarters, which implies the construction of huge buildings (still on-going). At the same time, high social marginalization is evident in the area, while a range of civil society organizations are trying to interact with the local government in order to get social and environmental benefits out of the intervention. For deepening our case study, we examine institutional documents and carry out qualitative interviews with main stakeholders involved in the redevelopment project. In the Chapter we argue that neither the government at a local level (the District) nor local civil society organizations are able to influence decision-making and governance processes. On the other hand, the Metropolitan City Authority (Capital City of Rome) interacts with main economic actors involved in the transformation process (the International Bank, the FS - Ferrovie dello Stato – National Railways, and local developers) within a developmet strategy which is metropolitan, which led to a concentration of benefits and a spreading of costs. The involvement of the local political authority (District) and civil society organizations in decision-making appears as a sideline mechanism without effective impact on the forms and content of governance.