Urban Gardening and the Struggle for Social and Spatial Justice

The book presents an in-depth and theoretically-grounded analysis of urban gardening practices (re)emerging worldwide as new forms of bottom-up socio-political participation. By complementing the scholarly perspectives through posing real cases, it focuses on how these practices are able to address - together with environmental and planning questions - the most fundamental issues of spatial justice, social cohesion, inclusiveness, social innovations and equity in cities. Through a critical exploration of international case studies, this collection investigates whether, and how, gardeners are willing and able to contrast urban spatial arrangements that produce peculiar forms of social organisation and structures for inclusion and exclusion, by considering pervasive inequalities in the access to space, natural resources and services, as well as considerable disparities in living conditions.

Chiara Certoma is a Research Fellow at the Centre for Sustainable Development at Ghent University

Susan Noori is an Independent Social Researcher

Martin Sondermann is a Research Fellow at the Academy for Spatial Planning and Research