LIAS Kolloquium: Urban Futures In The South
Ranabir Samaddar, LIAS Senior Fellow
18. Nov
In the winter semester 2026/27, the LIAS Colloquium will open its doors to the university community for the first time. The Fellows will present their current research projects, offering insights into the questions, methods and perspectives that shape their work. The weekly colloquium provides a space for focused exchange on the diverse research projects pursued at LIAS. All members of the university community are warmly invited to discover the programme and engage with the Fellows’ research.
Date: Wednesday, 18 Nov, 2026, 12:15-1:45 p.m.
Location: Campus Central Building| C40.530
The idea of an urban future impels speculation about time, but it also leads to struggles to imagine and act collectively on a desirable future. Therefore, the idea of urban future does not mean that we are seeking to predict the future, grip it in our hands, or despair of the time ahead. Urban future is an idea that offers a vital way to understand how our cities exist, thrive, and struggle to overcome difficulties, negotiate fault lines, and occasionally perish. It is not only the sign of the uncertain, but a critical reflection on temporality. This means there cannot be one single future in store for our cities, but multiple futures. We do not wait for the future; we work on it in the present. Future in this way becomes something more than a temporal issue, it becomes a practice. The future marked by varying future-making practices is thus a contentious field. It has multiple registers. This is even more true for cities of the South with their colonial histories, variegated paths to decolonisation and subsequent developments, and new logistical and ecological interfaces. Urban future thus invites thinking of future-making practices in cities, such as: literary, artistic, and cultural imagination about a desirable city; political history of the subaltern classes and their demands for a ‘humane’ and ‘just’ city; history of public disasters including climatic and epidemiological disasters and the role of urban solidarities (based on an ethos of mutual care and protection) in coping with such disasters – in the process, the city turning a new chapter of its life; planners’ and administrative visions linked with intergovernmental aid, investment, and public-private partnership; refugees, migrants, and aliens in the city lending it a plural/cosmopolitan character, and the contest between a nativist and plural/cosmopolitan future; and finally, evolution of an ‘urban economy’ in place of an ‘industrial economy’ and the role played by informal economy and public finance.