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Join us for our Final Conference
16, 17 November 2026, Paris  /  18 November 2026, Brussels

Co-producing Democratic Cities in Unequal Times

How can cities confront growing inequalities, democratic backsliding and environmental breakdown? What role can co-production play in rebuilding trust, supporting collective action and shaping more just urban futures?

The FAIRVILLE final conference will bring together researchers, activists, community organisations, practitioners and public institutions to reflect on the challenges that inequality poses to urban democracy, and on the role co-production can play in addressing them. Drawing on the project as a whole, including its urban labs in Athens, Berlin, Brussels, Cairo, Dakar, London and Marseille, the conference will open a broader conversation with external actors working on democracy, inequality and urban transformation.

The conference will explore how co-production can generate knowledge, relationships, political claims, forms of advocacy and, in some cases, institutional change. It will also address its tensions and limits, including unequal access to time, resources and legitimacy, and the conditions needed for co-production to support more durable forms of democratic practice.

DAY 1 – 16th Nov '26 – Paris (MSH Paris Nord)
Lessons from FAIRVILLE: Why co-production and how can co-production respond to democratic fragmentation and inequality?

Drawing on experiments conducted as part of the FAIRVILLE project, the first day of the conference will focus on the creation of urban inequalities through housing systems and urban environments, differential exposure to environmental risks and unequal protection against the effects of climate change. It will also examine how these processes shape the democratic capacities of cities and of citizens. During the morning session, academics and practitioners will discuss several FAIRVILLE case studies, exploring the dynamics of unequal urbanisation and their implications for urban governance, and the reinforcement of democracy and capacity for action.


The afternoon session will address the challenges of co-production in a context of democratic fragmentation, exploring its potential and limitations. Particular attention will be paid to issues of epistemic justice and the tools and methods of co-production, such as co-mapping, co-evaluation and counter-manuals, as well as the underlying power relations in the production of knowledge. These reflections will provide an overview of the methods tested within the FAIRVILLE framework alongside the broader theoretical questions that have shaped the project.

DAY 2 – 17th Nov '26 – Paris (Académie du Climat)
Co-production In Practice : Conditions, Tensions, and Implications

This second day of the conference focuses on the conditions necessary for effective co-production that can contribute to urban transformation, particularly in the face of environmental and climate changes that are challenging the ways in which cities are built, inhabited, and governed. It will examine the conditions for genuine horizontal governance and progressive urban cooperation, in a context marked by land and real estate pressures and a growing shortage of public resources.


The morning session will focus on the emergence of various forms of co-production rooted in local communities. A plenary session will explore the political implications of co-production as it relates to environmental issues, followed by parallel sessions devoted to its institutional and political dimensions, the role of intermediary actors in urban transformations, and the presence of conflicts within these processes.
The afternoon will focus on democratic support for co-production through the engagement of municipalities and local governments. In particular, it will examine the right to question, legal and institutional barriers, factors facilitating co-production, and mechanisms likely to support it over the long term.

DAY 3 – 18th Nov '26 – Brussels (ULB Faculty of Architecture)
After FAIRVILLE: Legacies, alliances and co-production futures

The third and final conference day will focus on the ways in which co-production practices, knowledge and alliances developed within FAIRVILLE have circulated and consolidated daily urban and environmental governance beyond the project. The day begins with the opening of the project’s itinerant exhibition. Drawing on experiences from the FAIRVILLE Labs, the exhibition explores urban inequalities and co-production as a situated practice, highlighting its tensions, possibilities, and the conditions needed for practices and alliances to endure and circulate beyond their local contexts.


Building on FAIRVILLE and related initiatives, the roundtable will bring together actors working across housing justice, public policy, municipal governance, research, advocacy, and civic organizing. A particular focus will be placed on the European Affordable Housing Plan as an opportunity to link EU-level agendas with local and civic action. The session will consider how housing alliances, municipalities, foundations, grassroots organisations, and public institutions can work together to develop more democratic, equitable and inclusive and accountable approaches to affordable housing. The conversation will also explore the contribution of the renewed municipalist movement alongside emerging municipal practices, especially where local governments are experimenting with new participatory and co-produced pathways to respond to housing inequalities and strengthen civic capacity.

Tentative Programme

Detailed programme with full speaker line-up will be made available in the coming weeks. 

DAY 1 – 16/11/2026 – MSH Paris Nord, Aubervilliers
Lessons from FAIRVILLE: Why co-production and how can co-production respond to democratic fragmentation and inequality?

09:00 - 09:30 // Welcome

 

09:30 - 10:00 // Introduction 

10:00 - 11:30 // Session 1: Locating Urban and Environmental Inequalities

Learnings from Fairville labs

11:30 - 11:45 > Coffee Break

11:45 - 12:45 // Session 2: Democracy, governance and unequal cities

How do urban inequality and democratic challenges reshape institutional trust and governance ?

12:45 – 13:45 > Lunch

13:45 - 14:30 // Keynote
Title (tbc)

14:30 - 15:30 // Session 3:  Co-production in Times of Democratic Backsliding

Why co-production? What kind of democratic openings?

 

15:30 - 15:45 > Coffee Break

 

15:45 - 17:15 // Session 4: Knowledge Co-production in practice

What are the tools and methods for knowledge co-production? What epistemological issues do they raise?

17:15 - 18:00 // Session 5: Concluding discussion

Conditions for transformative co-production in times of democratic backsliding

 

18:00 - 20:00 > Apéro & dinner ; Book presentation

DAY 2 – 17/11/2026 – Académie du Climat, Paris
Co-production In Practice : Conditions, Tensions, and Implications

09:00 - 09:15 // Welcome

Room: Salle des Fêtes 

09:10 - 09:30 // Introduction

09:30 - 11:00 // Opening Plenary

The politics of environment and risk-focused co-production

11:00 - 11:15 > Coffee break 

 

11:15 - 12:45 Parallel Sessions: Complexities, Tensions and Infrastructures of Co-production
 

Session 2A: Institutional perspectives on co-production

What engaged public officials think and do about co-producing the city in practice

Room: Salle la Pépinière (tbc)


Session 2B: Intermediation and facilitation for urban change
Who are intermediary actors and facilitators and how do they enable, translate, support or constrain co-production and urban transformation?
Room: Salle des Mariages (tbc)


Session 2C: Conflicts and Disagreements for Meaningful Co-production

Examining disagreement, friction and antagonism within co-production processes
Room: Salle des Fêtes (tbc)

12:45 - 13:45 > Lunch 
 

13:45 - 15:30 // Session 3: Catalysing democratic deepening: nurturing transformative co-production 
Room: Salle des Fêtes 


End of Day 2
17:25 > Train to Brussels 

DAY 3 – 18/11/2026 – ULB Faculty of Architecture, Brussels
What should remain? How do urban justice alliances, knowledge networks and co-production practices endure, and transform beyond the FAIRVILLE project

09:00 - 10:30 // Itinerant breakfast with exhibition:  Urban Inequality and Co-production
Exhibition and guided walking exploration

10:30 - 12:30 // Session:  After FAIRVILLE: Legacy, Alliances and Co-production Futures 

Roundtable discussion on Manifesto and other alliance-based co-production initiatives

 

12:30 - 13:00 // Closing remarks

 

13:00 - 14:00 > Lunch
 

End of conference

Programme to download soon available...

Pre-Registration

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By filling out this form, you are pre-registering for the final FAIRVILLE conference. Registered participants will receive a confirmation email at a later date.

Note: The conference will be held in English and French. Live translation will be provided.

 

Please register by 1st October 2026

Practical Info

Reaching the venue

Monday 16th November 2026

MSH Paris Nord - Universités Paris 8 & Sorbonne Paris Nord

20 Av. George Sand, 93210 Saint-Denis

https://maps.app.goo.gl/7oVV6BnV9z3AP7v77

By metro : Line 12 Station Front Populaire

Tuesday 17th November 2026

L'Académie du Climat

2 Pl. Baudoyer, 75004 Paris, France

maps.app.goo.gl/7aqgVYyCBkugyHdw8

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www.academieduclimat.paris

By metro: Station - Hôtel de Ville (1 & 11) – Saint-Paul (1) – Pont Marie (7)

By bus: Station - Académie du Climat – Lines 96 – 76 – 69 & N° 11 – N° 16

Wednesday 18th November 2026

ULB Museum, Faculté d’architecture de l’ULB : La Cambre Horta

Pl. Eugène Flagey 19, 1050 Brussels, Belgium

maps.app.goo.gl/5HqKfaLBE5N6uZRt6

By bus: N° 71 - Station Flagey

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Hotel suggestions for your stay in Paris: 

Hotel suggestions for your stay in Brussels: 

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Travelling Exhibition

18th November 2026

Vernissage at the ULB Musuem in the Faculty of Architecture, Brussels

Fairville Travelling Exhibition Itinerary

Brussels     18/11/26 to 18/12/26

Berlin          07/01/27 to 18/01/27

More info coming soon...

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This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon Europe research and innovation programme under the grant agreement No. 101094991

The associated partners The Bartlett Development Planning Unit (DPU) of University College London (UCL), Just Space and Co Produce It CIC's work on this project is funded by the UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) under the UK government’s Horizon Europe funding guarantee.

Home page photos by Audrey Debargue

Sketches by Sylvain Adam

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