How is the Initiative on Cities Making a Difference in Urban Scholarship?

We catalyze early-stage research that deepens understanding of cities and urban populations. Today, with over half the world’s population living in urban areas, it is more crucial than ever for scholars and practitioners to address the complex challenges facing 21st-century cities – and to shape the policies and practices that will shape their future. If you are a member of the BU community and interested in submitting a proposal, we encourage you to review our annual requests for proposals, which typically open in December or January.  
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724 result(s) found.

  • New Publication: “From heat racism and heat gentrification to urban heat justice in the USA and Europe”

    December 5, 2024
    A new article published in Nature Cities examines urban heat issues through new lenses of inequality, calling for researchers to bridge the gap between heat management and institutional discrimination. Focusing on the Global North, the authors, including IOC Director Loretta Lees and External Advisory Board Member Isabelle Anguelovski, argue that researchers and planners must consider […]

  • New Publication: “Housing Movements and Care: Rethinking the Political Imaginaries of Housing”

    December 19, 2023
    The IOC's Postdoctoral Research Associate Kenton Card recently authored a publication in Antipode: A Radical Journal of Geography alongside UC Berkeley Associate Professor Desiree Fields and Western Sydney University Associate Professor Emma R. Power. Their work focuses on housing movements and housing as a form of care. Read the full abstract here: "Care is a […]
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    New Publication: “Municipal finance shapes urban climate action and justice”

    February 16, 2024
    2022 Early Stage Urban Research award recipient Claudia V. Diezmartínez recently authored a publication in Nature Climate Change alongside Co-PI Anne G. Short Gianotti. Their research focuses on municipal finance and urban climate action. Read the full abstract here: "Implementing climate policies and programmes in cities requires substantial investments that inevitably entangle climate action with […]
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    New Publication: “Operationalizing climate justice in the implementation of Boston’s Building Performance Standard”

    September 18, 2024
    Dr. Claudia Diezmartínez, Professor Benjamin Sovacool, and Associate Professor Anne Short Gianotti have published a new paper on Nature Cities that analyzes the politics and processes of implementing climate justice plans in urban governments. Read the full abstract here: "Cities are moving toward the implementation of more just urban climate actions, but the politics and […]
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    New Publication: “Water sources for street trees in mesic urban environments”

    November 28, 2023
    2021 Early Stage Urban Research award recipient Ian Smith recently published in Science of The Total Environment with Co-PIs Pamela Templer and Lucy Hutyra. Smith, Templer, and Hutyra examine urban trees' water sources, factoring in moderate moisture environments and their impact on urban communities. Their research finds that trees contribute to cities' overall climate resiliency […]
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    New Publication: “What Constitutes Engaged Dialogue in Urban Research? Thoughts From a Long Time ‘Outside-Insider'”

    November 14, 2023
    Initiative on Cities Director Loretta Lees recently published a plenary in Dialogues in Urban Research focusing on inclusionary dialogue in urban studies and what needs to change. Read the abstract below: "In this plenary for the new journal Dialogues in Urban Research, I discuss what constitutes (and should constitute going forward) engaged dialogue in urban […]
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    New Publication: Boston’s Youth Participatory Budgeting

    January 25, 2017
    In 2013, Boston became the first city to create a youth-led participatory budgeting process. Now in its third year, Boston's Participatory Budgeting Project engages over 2,000 Boston youth ages 12-25 to determine how to spend one million dollars of the city’s capital budget. The Initiative on Cities is thrilled to publish Youth Lead the Change: […]
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    New Publication: Youth Participatory Budgeting

    February 22, 2017
    The IOC is pleased to announce a second paper published by the Boston University team of researchers exploring youth participatory budgeting. Their analysis is part of a broader study examining the scope, structure and functioning of 24 youth councils in the Boston-metro area. Among their findings, authors concluded that youth-led participatory budgeting has potential for […]
  • 54% of states & 40% of the nation's largest cities provide some form of COVID-19 rent relief.

    New Report on COVID-19 Housing Policy

    October 13, 2020
    The federal government’s response to the housing challenges created by COVID-19 has been limited, leaving state and local governments to create a patchwork of solutions. State and local governments have been forced to provide eviction and foreclosure protections and relief from rent, mortgages, and property taxes as federal government support falls well short of current […]

  • New Report on Growth of Public Interest Technology Initiatives at PIT-UN Member Institutions

    May 31, 2022
    Field of Public Interest Technology is Growing Despite Funding and Institutional Challenges  Boston University and New America Release Report on Growth of Public Interest Technology Initiatives at Members of Public Interest Technology University Network The still nascent field of public interest technology is growing at a rapid clip in higher education. Institutions need to build […]