2016 | Article of the Year

In 2016 Finisterra created an Annual Award for the Best Article published in the journal, selected by a commission nominated by the executive committee.

Finisterra extends warm congratulations to the winners of the 2016 best Article Award.

Winners are determined by vote. Manuscripts published in Finisterra are evaluated and rated on clarity in writing and content, organization, graphics, contribution to knowledge, etc.

On the 21st of february, after the Finisterra Annual Lecture (Janice Monk) some members of the panel of Judges announced the winners.

The Article of the Year, aims to reward the best article published in 2016, was awarded ex-aequo:

a) Simone Tulumello and Marco Picone, Shopping malls and neoliberal trends in Southern European cities: post-metropolitan challenges for urban planning policy, Finisterra – Revista Portuguesa de Geografia, LI(101): 111-132.

Whilst shopping malls have been explored at length by critical urban studies, there has been little exploration of their role in restructuring the practice of urban and spatial planning. This article uses the shopping mall as an object of study in the light of the neoliberal trends and post-metropolisation in Southern Europe, with the aim of exploring challenges for urban governance and planning practice and with a focus on the role of the ongoing economic crisis. A threefold exploratory framework – the ‘lost-in-time scenario’, the ‘messianic mall model’ and the ‘(im)mature planning explanation’ – is used to make sense of the local versions of shopping mall development in Lisbon (Portugal) and Palermo (Southern Italy). According to findings, we highlight the clash between the multi-scalar nature of shopping malls and the dominance of the municipal scale in regulatory planning frameworks, and the risk that shopping mall development (at least in Southern Europe) may replicate uneven development patterns, reproducing the pre-conditions of the crisis without helping to overcome it.

b) Pedro Porfírio Coutinho Guimarães, The effectiveness of the special projects of commercial urbanism: Evidence from Braga, Finisterra – Revista Portuguesa de Geografia, LI(102): 47-64.

The aim of this article is to analyse the process of implementation of the public programmes Procom and Urbcom in the city of Braga. These programmes were implemented in the territory through the special projects of commercial urbanism, peculiar mechanisms for the urban regeneration of commercial areas in Portugal based on integrated funding for the modernization of shops, the rehabilitation of public space and commercial animation. To analyse the effectiveness of both projects we conducted 50 surveys with entrepreneurs and four interviews with relevant stakeholders. Our findings show that the modernization of the outlets was already underway and it was going to be carried out even without adhering to the projects. In a similar process, the physical rehabilitation of the town centre was already under way. Thus, the role of the Procom and Urbcom projects was very limited. The promotional actions carried out by the Chamber of Commerce were ephemeral and concentrated in a limited number of commercial streets, which restricted their ability to produce positive impacts. Overall, due to this and the inability to minimize external threats we conclude that both projects were ineffective in the regeneration of the city centre of Braga.

The article of Anna Ortiz and Cristóbal Mendoza, Young Phd students from Europe and Latin America in Barcelona: migration experiences and everyday practices in the city, Finisterra – Revista Portuguesa de Geografia, LI(102): 81-101, was honored with an Honorable Mention by the jury.

Literature on international migration has partially studied student migration, which is seen as an outstanding migration flow in the current age of hypermobility. Even less explored is the study of the everyday experiences of this group and its relevance for understanding students' future migration patterns. This article fills a gap in the literature, and it focuses on the analysis of a group of foreign PhD students in Barcelona's universities. Specifically it revolves around their motivations for emigration, everyday experiences in the city, as well as labour and life trajectories in the light of future expectations. Living abroad is regarded as a point of no return in young people's transitions towards independence and adulthood. The paper explores the complex process of leaving home in relation with their everyday spatial practices and experiences. In this regard, their everyday lives in Barcelona opens up previously unexpected personal choices, with the city offering many personal potentialities concerning alternative uses of public places.

2016 | Article of the Year

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