Spectacular Events, City Spaces and Citizenship: The Commonwealth Games in Delhi *

Since the adoption of policies of economic liberalisation in the 1990s, successive governments have instituted spatial and social changes that converge around a common vision: making Delhi a ‘world-class’ city. This ambiguous yet evocative term has become a potent rallying point for state agencies, corporate capital and bourgeois citizens, who use it to authorise and endorse political action across a variety of scales. From clearing an ecologically-sensitive green area in south Delhi to build luxury hotels and malls, to demolishing the homes and workplaces of hundreds of thousands of urban squatters and migrants to curb air and water pollution (Baviskar, Sinha and Philip 2006), the project of making Delhi ‘world-class’ is radically restructuring the city’s landscapes, livelihoods and lifestyles.