Towards Urban Geopolitics of Encounter: Spatial Mixing in Contested Jerusalem

ABSTRACT

The extent to which ‘geographies of encounter’ facilitate tolerance of diversity and difference has long been a source of debate in urban studies and human geography scholarship. However, to date this contestation has focused primarily on hyper-diverse cities in the global north-west. Adapting this debate to the volatile conditions of the nationally-contested city, this paper explores intergroup encounters between Israelis and Palestinians in Jerusalem. The paper suggests that in the context of hyper-polarisation of the nationally-contested urban space, the study of encounter should focus on macro-scale structural forces. In Jerusalem, we stress the role of ethnonationality and neoliberalism as key producers of its asymmetric and volatile yet highly resilient geography of intergroup encounters. In broader sense, as many cities worldwide experience a resurgence of ethnonationalism, illuminating the structural production of encounter may demarcate a broader function for reading contemporary urban geopolitics.

Notes

1. Although non-Jews could theoretically rent or buy an apartment in these neighbourhoods, the neighbourhoods were planned, marketed, and institutionalised for the Jewish population.

2. Some of the influx in Palestinian professional employment in West Jerusalem can be attributed to an increase in the number of Palestinian citizens of Israel immigrating to Jerusalem from Arab localities (Masry-Herzalla and Razin 2014)

3. Among them: Azrielli group, Alrov, Sela Capital, and JTLV.