From Actor to Avatar

The Place of Mayors in Theories of Urban Governance

Dados Bibliográficos

ID5697343
AutoresMark Jayne (0000-0002-5150-4861, University of Manchester, autor correspondente)
Ano2011
Volume5
Fascículo11
Páginas801-810
Data de publicação2011-11-01
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoGeography Compass (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 1749-8198 • E-ISSN: 1749-8198
EditoraWiley (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1111/j.1749-8198.2011.00452.x
OpenAlexW1548027904
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas6
Referências citadas37

In contrast to political and social science writing geographers have been ambivalent about the efficacy of studying mayors in order to advance urban theory. Geographers’ engaged in studying urban governance have generally disavowed the relevance of theoretical and empirical engagement with specific actors and institutions in their consideration of space, scale and state strategy. Here I show that current theoretical developments nonetheless signpost the possibilities of a shift from an ambivalent view of mayor as ‘actor’, to a situation where consideration of mayor as ‘avatar’ offers useful ways of contributing to understanding of the abstract and complex spatialities of territorial and relational urban worlds

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