ABSTRACT
Introduction The economic and social crisis experienced by Spain over the last few years has had consequences that can largely be defined as ideological, institutional, and material, although the political response to the crisis has been articulated mainly through the material and institutional field, to manage the ideological changes that society has experienced. This chapter studies how and to what extent the Metropolitan Area of Barcelona (AMB) has suffered from the impacts of the crisis and the responses and mechanisms which have been applied in an attempt to overcome these impacts. The chapter starts with a short overview of the ‘Spanish Crisis’, giving special importance to the housing bubble and the institutional system that has facilitated this situation. It then analyses how the crisis has affected the AMB and its city model. In this context the situation of Barcelona is analysed and the main differences between the context of Barcelona and Spain are discussed to explain the management of the crisis in the material, ideological, and institutional fields. Then the analysis focuses on some of the most important policies applied by the City Council in response to the crisis impacts. Finally, in the conclusions, the new tendencies of Barcelona in the aftermath of the crisis are presented and some new lines of research are proposed.
