This collection offers a global perspective on the changing character of cities and the increasing importance that consumer culture plays in defining their symbolic economies. Increasingly, forms of spectacle have come to shape how cities are imagined and to influence their character and the practices through which we know them - from advertising and the selling of real estate, to youth cultural consumption practices and forms of entrepreneurship, to the regeneration of urban areas under the guise of the heritage industry and the development of a WiFi landscape. Using examples of cities such as New York, Sydney, Atlantic City, Barcelona, Rio de Janeiro, Douala, Liverpool, San Juan, Berlin and Harbin this book illustrates how image and practice have become entangled in the performance of the symbolic economy. It also argues that it is not just how the urban present is being shaped in this way that is significant to the development of cities but also that a prominent feature of their development has been the spectacular imagining of the past as heritage and through regeneration. Yet the ghosts that this conjures up in practice offer us a possible form of political unsettlement and alternative ways of viewing cities that is only just beginning to be explored. Through this important collection by some of the leading analysts of consumption, cities and space Consuming the Entrepreneurial City offers a cutting edge analysis of the ways in which cities are developing and the implications this has for their future. It is essential reading for students of Urban Studies, Geography, Sociology, Cultural Studies, Heritage Studies and Anthropology.

This work offers an assessment of the "entrepreneurial city" - its strengths, weaknesses, problems and consequences - assessing how far "post-Fordist" city government is truly entrepreneurial and whether this is the best way to run urban areas.

When middle-class residents fled American cities in the 1960s and 1970s, government services and investment capital left too. Countless urban neighborhoods thus entered phases of precipitous decline, prompting the creation of community-based organizations that sought to bring direly needed resources back to the inner city. Today there are tens of thousands of these CBOs—private nonprofit groups that work diligently within tight budgets to give assistance and opportunity to our most vulnerable citizens by providing services such as housing, child care, and legal aid. Through ethnographic fieldwork at eight CBOs in the Brooklyn neighborhoods of Williamsburg and Bushwick, Nicole P. Marwell discovered that the complex and contentious relationships these groups form with larger economic and political institutions outside the neighborhood have a huge and unexamined impact on the lives of the poor. Most studies of urban poverty focus on individuals or families, but Bargaining for Brooklyn widens the lens, examining the organizations whose actions and decisions collectively drive urban life.

An essential guide to building supportive entrepreneurial communities "Startup communities" are popping up everywhere, from cities like Boulder to Boston and even in countries such as Iceland. These types of entrepreneurial ecosystems are driving innovation and small business energy. Startup Communities documents the buzz, strategy, long-term perspective, and dynamics of building communities of entrepreneurs who can feed off of each other's talent, creativity, and support. Based on more than twenty years of Boulder-based entrepreneur turned-venture capitalist Brad Feld's experience in the field?as well as contributions from other innovative startup communities?this reliable resource skillfully explores what it takes to create an entrepreneurial community in any city, at any time. Along the way, it offers valuable insights into increasing the breadth and depth of the entrepreneurial ecosystem by multiplying connections among entrepreneurs and mentors, improving access to entrepreneurial education, and much more. Details the four critical principles needed to form a sustainable startup community Perfect for entrepreneurs and venture capitalists seeking fresh ideas and new opportunities Written by Brad Feld, a thought-leader in this field who has been an early-stage investor and successful entrepreneur for more than twenty years Engaging and informative, this practical guide not only shows you how startup communities work, but it also shows you how to make them work anywhere in the world.

"The public-private partnerships of the future will need to embody a triple-bottom-line approach that focuses on the new P3: people-planet-profit. This book is for anyone who wants to improve the way that we live in cities, without waiting for the glacial pace of change in government or corporate settings. If you are willing to go against the tide and follow some basic lessons in goal setting, experimentation, change management, financial innovation, and communication, real change in cities is possible."--Publisher's description.

Entrepreneurship in Cities focuses on the neglected role of the home and the residential neighbourhood context for entrepreneurship and businesses within cities. The overall objective of the book is to develop a new interdisciplinary perspective that links entrepreneurship research with neighbourhood and urban studies. A key contribution is to show that entrepreneurship in cities is more than agglomeration economies and high-tech clusters. This is the first book to connect entrepreneurship with neighbourhoods and homes, recognising that business activity in the city is not confined to central business districts, high streets and industrial estates but is also found in residential neighbourhoods. It highlights the importance of home-based businesses for the economy of cities. These often overlooked types of businesses and workers significantly contribute to the ‘buzz’ that makes cities favourable places to live and work.

Through the analysis of Indian metropolises, this volume critiques the reality of “entrepreneurial governance” that has emerged as a major urban development practice in cities of the global south. In neoliberal India, the use of management rhetoric in urban development has rapidly led to the growth of urban/peri-urban structures and spaces that are supposedly “smart” and “entrepreneurial”, which are networked within global systems of production, finance, technology/ telecommunication, culture and politics. Through diverse empirical evidence from India, particularly from the metropolises of New Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru and Chennai, this volume focuses on the fallout of the deployment of “entrepreneurial governance” practices at national, state and local levels. Foremost, it explores the impact of specific institutional and organizational reorientations and changing urban spatial landscapes at the local level; secondly, it discusses the socio-economic implications of rollback of the state and involvement of non-state organizations in governance as part of urban entrepreneurialism; further, it discusses the regulation of urban development projects by local governments and the impact of "entrepreneurial governance" for citizens, often resulting in social exclusion and inequality. Finally, it explores the inherent contradictions within political and institutional landscapes that can be described as “entrepreneurial”. Written by scholars from diverse disciplinary backgrounds, and focusing on different facets of entrepreneurial governance in Indian metropolises, this book is of interest to researchers of urban politics, public policy, urban sociology, anthropology, urban geography, planning and architecture.