Social Sustainability
Right to the City
Definition
The right to the city is the principle that all present and future inhabitants of cities — permanent or temporary — have the right to occupy, use, produce and enjoy just, inclusive, safe and sustainable cities, and to participate in the decisions that shape them. Articulated by Henri Lefebvre in 1968 as a demand for control over urban life by those who live it, the concept was institutionalised in the New Urban Agenda adopted at Habitat III (2016).
References
Supports definition and framing.
Supports definition and framing.
Overview
How it is used
The framework structures UN-Habitat policy, city charters (such as Mexico City's Charter for the Right to the City), civil society platforms (Global Platform for the Right to the City) and urban equity analysis.
Why it matters
Sustainability transitions will be won or lost in cities; the right to the city insists they be remade with and for their inhabitants, not merely around them.