ABSTRACT
This chapter offers a critical analysis of the promise and practice of urban alliance-building. After connecting our work on urban alliances to existing work in critical urban theory on the right to the city, it discusses contemporary alliance-building as a strategy for realising the ‘promise of the city’ as a space of democratic politics across difference. The chapter then moves from the ‘promise’ to the ‘practice’ of urban alliances, by considering an example of urban alliance-building in Sydney, Australia, asking: how does the practice of urban alliances in this city measure up to its promise? It also offers some brief reflections on the potentials and challenges of urban alliances as a mechanism for pursuing urban politics and democracy. The chapter explains the structure of the network of this movement specific to the Beyoglu district. The discussion is based on the challenges these solidarity movements face.
