National Policy Agendas Encounter the City: Complexities of Political-Spatial Implementation

Abstract

This article examines implementation of national political agendas in two urban settings—Israel’s program aimed at sole sovereign control of Jerusalem and Northern Ireland’s effort to build peace in Belfast. It is based on seven months of in-country research and 122 interviews conducted in 2015 and 2016. Political goals of united Jerusalem in Israel and shared future in Northern Ireland are problematized as they confront micro-scale urban dynamics and resistant patterns of community power. A national policy agenda aimed at managing a city requires a political-spatial process of implementation having erratic effects. National-urban disjunctions were found in fundamentally different national programs, illuminating the inherent disruptive quality of urban dynamics in resisting national mandates. Findings inform theories of policy implementation and urban governance, highlighting problematic characteristics of national goals when implemented in urban space and the role of ethnic and cultural interests operating outside formal urban governance institutions in impeding national directives.