Killer Cities

Through a combination of social theory, polemic and close attention to empirical detail, author Nigel Thrift demonstrates how and why cities cause mass animal death and hasten the destruction of the planet. The book then attempts to set out how 'we' can navigate out of the current situation and towards a world in which cities no longer act as killers but become aligned with the lives of other beings.

Killer Cities uses a combination of social theory, polemic and close attention to empirical detail to tell the story of how and why cities cause mass animal death and, in the process, hasten the destruction of the planet. This book is not just a lament, however. It is an attempt to navigate out of this mess of planned and unplanned violence towards a world in which cities no longer act as killers but become aligned with the lives of other beings. It offers pragmatic ways of diminishing the death toll and changing mindsets without ever minimizing the dilemmas that inevitably will have to be faced. Killer cities can be rehabilitated so that they offer brighter paths towards the future - for animals, for human beings, and for the planet. A new urban geography could be within our grasp. Indeed, it has to be, for all of our sakes.

Chapter 1: An uncommon humanity
Part I: Cities
Chapter 2: The Urban World
Part II: Life
Chapter 3: Thinking Animals
Chapter 4: Animals Thinking
Part III: Death
Chapter 5: The Animal City
Chapter 6: The City of Surplus Death
Chapter 7: Not Meat but Still Dead
Chapter 8: But Some Animals Do Adapt to the City
Part IV: A New Settlement
Chapter 9: Dreaming More Human Cities 1
Chapter 10: Dreaming More Human Cities 2
Chapter 11: There is Another World but It Is This One
References