The Politics of the Encounter is a spirited interrogation of the city as a site of both theoretical inquiry and global social struggle, expanding upon the ideas of Henri Lefebvre that undergird much of our thinking about urbanization and urban society.

This is a spirited interrogation of the city as a site of both theoretical inquiry and global social struggle. The city, writes Andy Merrifield, remains ""important, virtually and materially, for progressive politics."" And yet, he notes, more than forty years have passed since Henri Lefebvre advanced the powerful ideas that still undergird much of our thinking about urbanisation. Merrifield rethinks the city in light of the vast changes to our planet since 1970, when Lefebvre's Urban Revolution was first published.