ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the author approaches by examining the notion of empowerment and its application to the service of community-building in this new urban order that the contemporary urban moment makes a different kind of utopianism possible. Communities place boundaries on the kinds of justifications that can be offered legitimately in various situations and conditions. Recognition of open engagement of citizens in the design and management of communities as a civic right is an even greater challenge. Generating effective, empowered engagement of the urban community is more than a question of creating opportunities for input, in the pragmatic view. A pragmatic, anti-utopian utopianism that is in tune with the demands of contemporary urban life and engagement as it seeks inspiration and elevation of ideals. Arguments about the unity and diversity in the common good of the utopian city have risen and fallen since the advent of modern society.
