Methodologies for Reconstructing

New Landscapes of Consumption and Production

Abstract

This working paper outlines a new methodology, actionable theory, for critically investigating the ‘public’ spaces produced within large-scale luxury developments in New York City. Actionable theory offers different means for intervening in such processes and new openings for a proposal that challenges the production of highly uneven urban landscapes, by shifting existing power dynamics within a development site. The proposal is a legislated body called Public Action Review Collaborative (PARC). PARC works to counter the stratification of publics along racial and class lines by moving past distributive notions of justice and offering institutionalized mechanisms in which a representational public can participate in the decision making process affecting their environment.