'GREEN FIX' AS CRISIS MANAGEMENT. OR, IN WHICH WORLD IS MALMO THE WORLD'S GREENEST CITY?

摘要

As economic and ecological crises evolve in combination, some policy strategies might aim at killing the two birds with one stone. One recent example can be found in Malmo, Sweden, where crisis management has operated, we propose, as a green fix. The district of Vastra hamnen (Western Harbour) is at the centre of the reinvention of the city: once the home of a world-leading shipyard, it is now a no less prominent neighbourhood of ecological virtues. Through outlining the history of Malmo in general and the Western Harbour in particular, we identify how the municipality and local capital in concert increasingly used "green" strategies in the urban policies that started as crisis management in the 1990s. Today Malmo is reckoned to be among the world's greenest cities, and we reflect on the importance of this international recognition for the city. Finally, we develop a critique of the green fix as concealing crucial factors of scale, and hence running the risk of myopia.