ABSTRACT
This chapter examines town twinning schemes that have emerged between urban communities in Eastern and Western Europe since the end of World War II. It explores how the fall of communism in Europe has impacted East–West town twinning practices. The chapter shows how East–West town twinning practices changed after 1989, against the backdrop of the emergence of neoliberal urbanism. Since the end of World War II, towns and cities across Europe have established institutionalized, border-crossing, bilateral relationships, usually referred to as town twinning. Historiography mainly emphasizes the reconciliatory and integrative capacities of postwar town twinning projects in Europe, whereas more contemporary studies assess the significance and practices of town twinning against the backdrop of developmental aid, neoliberalism, sub-state diplomacy, and shifting geographies of globalization. The chapter outlines town twinning and examines the development of postwar European town twinning and the subsequent interpretative frameworks that scholarship has offered to understand its practices and aims.
