ABSTRACT
This chapter examines how utopian horizons can productively contribute to the consolidation of oppositional politics. It presents the experiences of urban activists in Lebanon who have been insistently crafting inclusive and ecological modalities of city-making and urbanism, enabling the deployment of political imaginaries that have informed advocacy and protests over the start of twenty first century. Despite the hegemonic apparatus of political sectarianism, mobilization and advocacy in Lebanon have been active across many spheres, including the urban, since the early 1990s. One of the key elements that enabled the consolidation of urban activism was the establishment of several graduate programs in urban studies and planning in public and private universities. As Lebanon illustrates well, the dominant model of growth-led global urbanism is not sustainable. Other modalities of city-making are imperative and need to be incorporated in the struggles and movements seeking political and economic change.
