[URBANTH-L] ANN: Welfare City - Urban Equality and Globalization: Urban Studies Summer Postgraduate Course (Finland)

[Angela Jancius]

Welfare City - Urban Equality and Globalisation
Urban Studies Postgraduate Course
University of Helsinki and Helsinki University of Technology
August 16 to 31, 2005

This summer school course will explore Helsinki as a Nordic welfare city
with its modernistic architecture, welfare-oriented governance and civil
servant urban planning tradition. In the 1990s and the current decade,
Helsinki suddenly has had to deal with global competition and meet the
demands of an information technology cluster driven by Nokia, the
largest mobile phone producer in the world. The booming high tech
-industry and other urban processes relating to globalisation have
brought unprecedented wealth to some, but they have also complicated the
conception of social equality in this city. Plans to close down public
healthcare centres and libraries have recently raised concerns about
public confidence in the welfare system in Helsinki and have led to
public expressions of dissent. The central topics of this course are the
consequences of globalisation for everyday life in a rationalistically
planned and social-democratically led society and the response of cities
to these new challenges.
* *
Lectures and excursions in the Helsinki metropolitan area will serve to
exemplify and illuminate the distinctive urban strategies and policies
in a Nordic city in general and Helsinki in particular. We will also
discuss problems being faced by the welfare institutions in Helsinki on
a smaller scale by taking a closer look at how certain segments of
society (for example women and the elderly) are being affected by
welfare policies. The main objective of the course is to investigate the
interplay of macro- and micro-level developments in the social, economic
and spatial structure of the city. This will be achieved by taking a
closer look at some participatory planning and governance practices used
in the Helsinki region. The applicability of the example of Helsinki to
other urban environments will be considered in the students'
international workshops.

The interactive working methods of the course include illustrative
excursions in the Helsinki metropolitan region and thematic workshops
where questions of urban policy and urban planning will be worked
through with other students and an assistant.

Lecturers of the course include Professor Anne Haila (University of
Helsinki), Senior Research Fellow Mervi Ilmonen (Helsinki University of
Technology), and leading contemporary urban intellectuals of Finland:
professors, scholars, and people working in business and administration.

For more information, please see http://summerschool.helsinki.fi/ or
contact summer-school at helsinki.fi <mailto:summer-school at helsinki.fi>.
Questions concerning the content of this course can be directed to
course assistant Jussi Kulonpalo (jussi.kulonpalo at helsinki.fi) or Dr
Turo-Kimmo Lehtonen (turo-kimmo.lehtonen at helsinki.fi
<mailto:turo-kimmo.lehtonen at helsinki.fi>).