Cairo as Neoliberal Capital? From Walled City to Gated Communities

Abstract

The new dimension of Cairo is marked by a flight of the urban elites made more visible by the de-densification of the urban center. Within this optic, the gated communities must appear as a privileged window onto the reality of liberalization in Egypt. Analysis of these settlements allows us to understand how mechanisms of risk control impose social exclusion and how they define the risks themselves. Urban ecology and the priorities of security are reversed to favor suburban desert colonies: defensive bastions against the lost metropolis. This chapter also traces the material development of the gated communities, their promotion and appropriation. Then it identifies the risk discourses that create the foundation for, and enable the legitimation of, the renewed management of social distances. However, first, it is appropriate to define what it means by fear, risk, myth, and urban ecology.

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