About this book:

*Cities of Change* explores the urban evolution of New York, Mexico City, São Paulo, and Buenos Aires from the late nineteenth century to the digital age. By framing these metropolises as "laboratories of modernity," the book examines how plural pathways of growth have reshaped social life. It moves beyond traditional top-down narratives to prioritize "street-level" urbanism, analyzing how migration, housing, labor, and infrastructure are negotiated through a constant dialogue between formal planning and informal practices.

The text details the development of specific housing typologies—tenements, *vecindades*, *cortiços*, and *conventillos*—illustrating how density and scarcity forced residents to invent architectures of survival. It argues that informality is not a sign of urban failure but a foundational grammar of growth that sustains economies, mobility, and community resilience when official systems falter. Central to the narrative is the role of the resident—from street vendors and domestic workers to activists and artists—who actively produces the city through everyday innovation and social negotiation.

The book further addresses the challenges of the twenty-first century, including environmental risk, climate resilience, and the rise of digital urbanism. It highlights how racial, ethnic, and gendered hierarchies are embedded in the urban fabric, affecting everything from policing to the "care economy." By comparing these four distinct yet interrelated cities, the work reveals that urban modernity is an unfinished and contested experiment. Ultimately, it calls for governance and planning that acknowledge informality and prioritize equity, recognizing that the most resilient urban solutions often emerge from the grassroots.