11:31 a.m.
CFP: Session at the European Association for Urban History (EAUH) conference, Barcelona,
from Wednesday September 2 to Saturday September 5, 2026.
https://www.eauhbarcelona2026.eu<https://www.eauhbarcelona2026.eu/>
Please circulate this among your networks for anyone who might be interested.
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Infrastruggles and citizenship: Urban public services, 1840–1940
Session 56
Organizers
Magnus Linnarsson
Stockholm University, Stockholm
Greet De Block
University of Antwerp
Keywords
public services, urban politics, citizenship, infrastructure, welfare services
Presentation
In the second half of the nineteenth-century, cities across the continent and in the
British Isles began to invest money and resources in various types of large-scale
infrastructure systems. Local authorities and politicians gradually took greater
responsibility in improving welfare and well-being of urban citizens by providing
connections with new, efficient and healthy infrastructure networks, such as sewage
systems, water supply systems, rail transportation and hospitals. Also, new forms of
regulation and identification of citizens’ bodies and practices emerged in relation to
these networks. In order to accomplish this feat, an increasing number of urban public
services were instituted, particularly between 1840 and 1940. Municipal governments became
providers of public goods, rather than mere administrators of social obligations.
These public services were the result of both political strife and a growing sense of
social responsibility and control of city authorities. At the same time, the extension of
public services and the access to the ‘welfare city’ opened new opportunities for
bargaining and negotiating the right to the city. While an increasing number of urban
residents were granted access to public provision, inaccessibility and the exclusion of
population became more visible. This meant a change in the nature of politics and
increased contestation and politization. Those who were connected and benefited from the
new public services demanded a say in their organisation and management. Those who were
not connected, were denied access to the city, and ‘infrastruggles’ became the battle
ground to claim citizenship. Thus, problematisations of access to infrastructure was
formative for the emerging features of citizenship
The period 1840–1940 encompasses a processual shift in what kind of public services were
central to municipal authorities, from material infrastructures to more social, cultural
and green services, and the session aims to discuss this shift. The session invites papers
on various aspects of the expansion of urban public services in the period 1840–1940. We
are particularly interested in papers dealing with both infrastructure and urban
citizenship. Furthermore, we welcome papers addressing political conflicts about the
expansion of public services, as well as papers addressing the topic of public or private
administration of said services.
https://www.eauhbarcelona2026.eu<https://www.eauhbarcelona2026.eu/>
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Magnus Linnarsson
Professor of History
Stockholm University
Department of History
Mail address: SE-106 91 Stockholm, Sweden
Visiting address: Room D965, Universitetsvägen 10 D, floor 9
E-mail: magnus.linnarsson(a)historia.su.se
Phone: +46-(0)8 16 20 21
Web: http://www.su.se/profiles/mlinn
Web: www.historia.su.se
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