The Political Ecology of the Metropolis: Metropolitan Sources of Electoral Behaviour in Eleven Countries [Hardcover]

This volume undertakes the first international comparative analysis of metropolitan political behaviour.A growing majority of humanity lives in sprawling, interconnected urban regions. Diversified metropolitan geographies have replaced the centuries-old divide between urban and rural areas, and transformed the local sources of electoral politics. The resulting patterns of electoral support and participation have shifted axes of partisan competition to the right. This volume undertakes the first international comparative analysis of metropolitan political behaviour. The results support a powerful new thesis to explain many recent shifts in political behaviour: the metropolitanisation of politics.Contributors xviiPreface 1Chapter One: Introduction  the Metropolitanisation of PoliticsJefferey M. Sellers and R. Alan Walks 3Chapter Two: Place, Institutions and the Political Ecology of USMetropolitan AreasJefferey M. Sellers 37Chapter Three: Metropolitan Political Ecology and Contextual Effectsin CanadaR. Alan Walks 87Chapter Four: Political Ecology of Metropolitan Great BritainR. Alan Walks 125Chapter Five: The Emerging Metropolitan Political Ecology of FranceVincent Hoffmann-Martinot and Jefferey M. Sellers 161Chapter Six: The Metropolitan Bases of Political Cleavage inSwitzerlandDaniel K?bler, Urs Scheuss and Philippe Rochat 199Chapter Seven: Does Political Ecology Matter? Voting Behaviour inGerman Metropolitan AreasMelanie Walter-Rogg 227Chapter Eight: The Political Ecology of the Spanish Metropolis  Place,Socio-Economic and Regional EffectsClemente J. Navarro 267Chapter Nine: Metropolitan and Political Change in SwedenDaniel K?bler and Henry B?ck 299Chapter Ten: The Delocalised Homo Politicus  The PoliticalEcology of Polish Metropolitan AreasPaweB Swianiewicz 325Chapter Eleven: The Political Ecology of Czech Metropolitan Areas is there a Post-Communist Metropolitan Model?Tom?a Kosteleck?, Daniel erm?k and Jana Vobeck? 355Contentsvi The Political Ecology of the M