Circulating Asian Urbanisms: An Analysis of Policy and Media Discourse in Africa and Latin America

Abstract

sian investments in housing and urban development are increasingly reaching Africa and Latin America: African urban property is seen as a last frontier for global capital.9 Current African – and to some extent Latin American – property investment often takes a particular form, inspired by Asian examples: entirely new cities are built up from scratch as comprehensively planned self-contained enclaves in the outskirts of existing cities. Meanwhile, Latin America is also looking at copying South Korean ‘city-in-a-box’ ideas and attracting Chinese investment in urban infrastructure. In this chapter we will scrutinize such new Asian investments – and their related ideological and human mobilities – from the point of view of African and Latin American national discourses in media and policy. We will specifically focus on two case studies: South Korean urban model transferred to Ecuador in Yachay Knowledge City Chinese urban investment in the planned new city at Modderfontein, Johannesburg, South Africa.