This paper examines growth machine politics operating in shrinking cities. Instead of de-growth politics logics emerging in shrinking cities, the paper finds, through an empirical study of Zonguldak, a shrinking mining city in Turkey, a politics that is better described as another variant of growth machine politics. Invigorated by the difficulties encountered in the implementation of state-driven growth agendas, and the subsequent reactions of local stakeholders, Zonguldak’s emerging policy agenda maintains a distance from the discourse of growth and instead adopts such themes as ecology, industrial heritage, quality of life and liveability when reframing and deploying a variety of conventional practices to make the city attractive for investment. In so doing, a broad coalition of diverse local interests are effectively brought together, and this paper suggests that these dynamics characterise a politics that is better described as adaptive response to align with growth machine politics. To explore this, the paper builds on an exploratory research design that complements secondary and documentary data analysis of the city’s economic and population trends and key policy and planning documents with an analysis of unstructured interviews with local policy makers and focus groups with local stakeholders.
Beyond Growth Machine Politics: Understanding State Politics and National Political Mandates in China’s Urban Redevelopment
