Urban unboundings: a concept under construction

Summary The expression urban unboundings is working as a driving force for a collective reflection about urban peripheries in Latin America and Spain: a reflection which intends to generate useful knowledge that can be applied in terms of diagnosis and intervention. The notion of limit, inherent to town planning and revitalized today from an ecological point of view, as well as the concept of border, which takes us back to binomials of high theoretical relevance, such as inclusion-exclusion and centre-periphery, engage with the metaphor urban unboundings to shine a light on new perspectives of analysis. To consider the peripheral city in terms of unboundings leads us to wonder not just what unbounds and how, but also for what reason and for whom. In this regard, it introduces a political vision that enables urban phenomena to be interpreted in terms of the articulation of actors and balances of power, inherent in the mechanisms of control and planning. This in turn allows us to interpret the phenomenon as desirable or non-desir able depending on social equality and environmental sustainability. From this type of speculative analysis, in line with the logic of each local context, are derived reflections and tools that can be useful for the policy, project and management of urban peripheries.