Urban Studies

Future of Self-Sufficient Cities

With the ricing of the global temperature, the growing demand for urban spaces and the fast development of new technologies, the next few years we are facing an era unprecedented in the history of mankind. How to design cities that can, at the time, improve the quality of life of its inhabitants and contribute to reverse climate change?

Future of Urban Learning

With the accelerated development of new technologies and the growing global interconnectivity, the development of long-term projects becomes increasingly unpredictable. What are the major challenges that the design of cities will face in the future for which we are not yet ready?

Urban Data: Limits of Control

Each city has a digital trace. And the more it is, the better we understand and manage the city. For example, data analysis of mobile operators have shown that 2/3 of Moscow residents do not leave their district or home in the first half of the day. So, it is in many ways a myth that Muscovites are constantly moving.

But where is the boundary between control and total control? And who owns the information about the citizens?

Future of Technologies for Architecture

The development of digital technologies such as robotics, 3D printing, AI, Internet of things, etc., is transforming the processes of design, manufacture and construction of buildings in the world. What are the possibilities and limitations of these new technologies?

What Awaits Us in the Future: How to be Successful and in Demand in a Rapidly Changing World?

We are living in a fast changing rapidly urbanizing world. Our parents and grandparents were

 working for one company in one specialization for the entire life. This scheme is not applicable anymore. Our life will consist of many careers, but not of one career for the entire life. In this sense, the role of education is changing and a skill of fast learning is becoming one of the most essential. How to structure the learning process to make it the most effective? How to design your individual learning track not only during the formal education, but during the whole life? How to make educational process interesting and motivating?

The webinar will be useful for: 

• for anyone interested in self-development and learning the skills of the future;
• student of different specializations who would like to learn how to learn fast and which skills
• should be in focus of attention to develop;
• for tutors and professors who would like to get a fast overview of the main skills and learning
• schemes that are changing the education.

How to Look at the City: Strategies and Tools for Critical Analysis of Urban Landscapes

The webinar will be dedicated to the critical analysis of the changing urban environment and the best strategies of keeping critical gaze that one might need in their research. How to choose what to study, what characteristics of a place to pick up for analysis? How to preserve the specific critical agenda?  This seminar will be dedicated to various data sets, which might be used for urban analysis - from statistics to satellite data and sounds, how to combine and unite them and which results to expect.

The Future City Challenge of Privacy in Public Space

Historically, anonymity has been an essential element and a major appeal of living in a city. It is an irony of our time that city has turned into a place where privacy is most at stake.  Ubiquitous technology on which our urban lives depend has far-reaching legal and social implications. By constantly providing our data to the state and businesses in exchange for safety and free services, we have turned into ‘suspects’ and ‘consumers’.   However, as citizens we can protect our rights in public space. Although, the right to privacy is not absolute, there are strict legal rules for when and how it can be limited.   

At the webinar we will discuss: 

• What is the right to privacy, and how it is different from the right to data protection?
• Why the power of data in public space must come with great responsibility? 
• Why does no one read city services’ Terms of Use?
• What are the legal grounds for banning facial recognition software? 
• What can cities and citizens do to safeguard the right to privacy?  

The webinar will appeal to scholars and students in a variety of academic disciplines, including law, sociology and urban studies.

Urban Governance and its Opponents: How Protests Challenge City Development

Urban growth and development faces challenges not just in mobilizing resources and facing economic, technological, and ecological issues. Contemporary city governments are increasingly concerned with the demand for participation of their inhabitants. Moreover, contentious action against urban development projects all over the world has become a crucial moment for the politicization of city dwellers and their becoming as citizens. “Not-in-my-backyard” protests have transformed into political protests against the very core of neo-liberal urban governance and challenge the development models of future cities. This webinar gives an overview of the main directions and forms of urban protest from an international comparative perspective.