Author Archives: kvdvaart

This post has been edited and rewritten (not deleted because of companion’s comment). For the replacement post, click here. It is particularly important to look at the way in which cities manage their water, as they are 2% of land surface on Earth, yet account for 60-80% of energy consumption and 75% of global CO2Continue reading “The ‘Sinking’ Blue City?”

Kate Raworth, from Oxford University’s Environmental Change Institute, created a new economic model, based on a shifted attitude of economics: one that aims to find an equilibrium between social and ecological factors encompassing humanity’s well-being. Instead of emphasizing the current linear goal of a never-ending GDP growth, this conceptual framework of social and planetary boundariesContinue reading “Doughnut Economics: Amsterdam’s post-coronavirus economic plan”

Although the digitalisation of cities seems like a 21st century issue, efforts to improve city services through data analytics have existed since the 1960s (Mora & Bolici, 2017). Thus, comes the well-known concept of a “Smart City”. The European Commision defines it as a place where the urban, political, and ecological combine with the technological.Continue reading “How Smart is Amsterdam?”

During a health crisis, the effects of the high paced nature of life in urban spaces including accelerated urbanization, faster and more effective transportation, architectural development, and international tourism become obvious (Keil et al, 2020). In a separate article, Keil et al (2018) discuss the intricacies of the racialization of diseases in Toronto during theContinue reading “Oma and Opa in times of Corona”

According to the World Economic Forum, Amsterdam has the 12th most trees of any city with 20.6% of the city populated with them. However, when it came to cities with the highest percentage of green spaces, Amsterdam did not make the top 20. With only 13% of Amsterdam covered in public parks and gardens, comparedContinue reading “Where does Amsterdam’s ‘green’ image come from?”

In a city as deeply associated with water as Amsterdam, water management is a particularly important theme to analyze within urban political ecology. Especially in terms of municipal goals to become ‘circular’, which focus on effective use of resources such as raw materials, energy and water (van der Hoek, 2017).  Despite the epistemological divide betweenContinue reading “Waternet and Amsterdam’s Municipality: teamwork makes the dream work”

So, why are the Dutch looked up to as an example not only when it comes to handling environmental issues, but economic ones as well? The answer lies in the ‘polder model’, one that values consensus and cooperation rather than confrontation, with deep historical roots that have created the foundation for a cultural tradition. TheContinue reading “The Dutch Polder Model: the cultural basis for Amsterdam’s environmental success”