Friedrich Lenger. Metropolen der Moderne

Urban studies is currently in the midst of a scholarly renaissance. From the establishment of new interdisciplinary graduate programs to the growing number of municipal think tanks specializing in urban and regional planning, social science research on the city is expanding. This is particularly true in Europe, and it holds true even when the topic is the end of the urban as we have known it. The “shrinking city” has been a topic for conference discussion over the past few years, and the “end of the city” has been declared. What defines a modern city today? This seems to be an open question. Friedrich Lenger has responded to the Zeitgeist with a large, and largely fascinating, book on the history of modern European cities. The volume's approach is signaled in its title: “metropoles” are here the nodes of modern development. But this immediately raises several questions. What defines a metropole? And how does Lenger define modernity?

Art · Art history · Humanities · Modernity · Political science · Resizing · Sociology · The Renaissance · Zeitgeist · European history and politics · History · Law