Urban Studies current issue

Introduction: Faith-based Organisations and Urban Social Issues

Beaumont, J. — 2008-08-07

Faith Action on Urban Social Issues

Beaumont, J. — 2008-08-07

What evidence supports or refutes the claim articulated from various quarters that faith-based organisations (FBOs) have been repositioned as actors for combating social problems like poverty and social exclusion in cities? This paper explores FBOs as agents of social change in contemporary cities in Europe, with a glance at the US. The argument is, first, that we need to conceptualise changing dynamics between religion, politics and post-secular society in the conviction that cities are the pre-eminent loci where these new relations are forming with intensity. While state restructuring and the urbanisation of political action are well-documented processes, far less is known about similar changes in the governance of religious institutions and their consequences for the urbanising relations between religion and the public sphere. Secondly, there are a number of empirical instances of FBOs involving faith-motivated and other people who respond to problems of poverty and social exclusion in various cities across Europe and suggest a changing public role of FBOs in social and political issues. Such repositioning, however, does not relate to the public sphere without tensions and ambiguities and the paper draws out some implications for theory and practice that guide a new international and multidisciplinary research agenda.

Faith in Politics

Jamoul, L., Wills, J. — 2008-08-07

Civil society is often seen as providing a social foundation from which to combat injustices perpetuated by the state and the corporate sector. Faith institutions are an integral and often overlooked component of this abstract civil society. In this paper, it is argued that faith has an important role to play in offering answers to the challenges posed by increasing inequalities and urban injustice. The major faith traditions share a commitment to `looking out' to the wider community and testing faith through action. While this is often expressed as charity, service provision or interfaith dialogue, there is also the potential to politicise this impetus to engage. At present, faith institutions have been encouraged to get involved in `community cohesion' and `regeneration' schemes in urban areas, but it is argued that there is scope for faith organisations to develop a much more independent form of political engagement within their local communities. Using the example of London Citizens, a broad-based organisation, it is suggested that there is an alternative political route for faith institutions with an emphasis on the battle for justice. London Citizens is an alliance of about 90 civil society institutions, predominantly from the faith sector, but it also includes labour, educational and community-based organisations. It now has a decade of organising experience and the paper explores the basis on which people of faith join the alliance, how they work together and the effects this politicisation has on the institutions and people involved.

The Immigrant Church as an Urban Service Hub

Ley, D. — 2008-08-07

This paper draws from interviews conducted with leaders of 46 immigrant Christian churches in Vancouver. The congregations comprise newcomers from Korea, ethnic Chinese who are primarily recent immigrants and an older post-1945 German migration. The churches are identified as a hub in which relations of trust and compatibility generate bonding social capital; from this base, a wide range of personal and social services is provided, significantly aiding co-ethnic members to adapt to their new conditions. In a neo-liberal era, the state is facilitating such activities as part of a policy of contracting-out its own former in-house functions. The capacity of the immigrant church to serve both its own members and adherents and also a broader expanded constituency beyond its co-ethnic clients is important. The paper examines the activities of some of the churches in this transition from bonding to bridging social capital and the challenges that they confront.

Context Determines Content: Quantum Physics as a Framework for `Wholeness' in Urban Transformation

Rosado, C. — 2008-08-07

We live in a divided world dominated by a fragmentary worldview that treats the wholeness of the human family, urban environments and social reality as inherently discrete, distanced and disconnected. This fragmentary perspective, emerging from Greek dualism and fuelled by the Newtonian mechanical view of the world with its Cartesian split of either/or understanding of reality, does not lead to wholeness. Almost all discussion of urban social policies emerges from a context of fragmented thinking. Drawing from quantum physics, this paper presents a theoretical framework, a new `context' for understanding urban environments and the implementing of programmes of urban transformation, including faith-based programmes. The paper examines examples of effective change agents who have made a difference in people's lives. It culminates with an analysis of the broken window theory and how the differences in approaches—fragmentation or wholeness—generate different results. The critical point is in recognising the energy patterns and operative attractor fields from which emerge negative or positive patterns of behaviour.

When God and Poverty Collide: Exploring the Myths of Faith-sponsored Community Development

Winkler, T. — 2008-08-07

Inspired by British and American religion—state practices and social capital theories, South Africa's National Religious Leaders' Forum (NRLF) and the National Religious Association for Social Development (NRASD) seek similar policy directives to empower a local, but undifferentiated, `faith sector'. For the NRLF/NRASD, the `faith sector' is the best-placed agency to facilitate pragmatic community development projects with far-reaching poverty alleviation impacts, provided the state assists faith organisations via public-sector grants. This paper will, therefore, test claims made by the NRLF/ NRASD regarding faith organisations' social service capacities in a case-specific context—namely, Hillbrow, Johannesburg. And research findings will demonstrate that financial aid alone is insufficient to remedy existing development inadequacies. Case study findings may also highlight generic difficulties found in faith-sponsored development projects throughout South Africa.

Expressions of Charity and Action towards Justice: Faith-based Welfare Provision in Urban New Zealand

Conradson, D. — 2008-08-07

Christian churches have long been involved in responding to social need in New Zealand cities. Since the formation of city missions in the late 19th century, their engagements have variously encompassed emergency relief, social housing, orphanages and residential aged care. In recent years, the churches and their affiliated social service operations have also sought to intervene in the political and social processes that contribute to disadvantage in New Zealand. The article analyses this movement towards a more explicit concern for social justice, with specific reference to developments among a set of Christian social service organisations in the city of Christchurch between 1999 and 2006. Alongside transformations in local services, national lobbying to highlight the situation of disadvantaged social groups has been an important element of this transition. The analysis offers insights into the place of faith-based welfare organisations within socio-political settings that might be characterised as `third way' or `after neo-liberalism'.

'Prophets-for-Profits': Redevelopment and the Altering Urban Religious Landscape

Mian, N. A. — 2008-08-07

This paper examines the redevelopment activities of religious institutions in the greater New York City area. In recent years, more and more churches have been selling their property and air rights to create either commercial and market-rate housing or affordable housing. Through archival material and interviews with pastors, the purpose of this descriptive paper is to understand why and how religious institutions, primarily churches, decide to alter their function by becoming entrepreneurial and engaging in property development. The changing character of these institutions is explained through the lens of theories of religious ecology and institutional isomorphism. The paper concludes with suggestions for improvement of the development process.

Commentary: From Faith in the City to Faithful Cities: The `Third Way', the Church of England and Urban Regeneration

Dinham, A. — 2008-08-07

In 1984, the Church of England published a critique of urban life, Faith in the City, which Thatcher's government accused of `Marxism'. A new Church of England report, Faithful Cities, marks its 20th anniversary. This article asks how the challenges of the earlier report have been inherited, arguing that the new one accepts the logic of the `Third Way', problematising the city as a place of untapped `citizens', waiting to be transformed by the agency of civil society partners including faith communities. In doing so, it fails to criticise the political consensus of markets and social justice. The effectiveness of the Church of England in cities should now be understood, therefore, as predominantly associated with meso-level community interventions and not at the macro level where a critique of the political could occur. The article asks whether this also sets an example for the stances of churches elsewhere.