Berlin: The Genius of Improvisation

Berlin is a city that continues to fascinate. It has a tormented history, is the capital of two reconciled Germanies, is an increasingly popular tourist destination, and has affordable living and workspaces for young people, artists, and other creative minds. The 3.7-million metropolis is also the scene for large-scale urban and architectural projects, bottom-up projects, and citizens’ initiatives such as communal gardening, cooperative living and other urban innovations. Is the miracle of Berlin’s success due to its genius of improvisation, that is to say its ability to adapt to a complex history, to invent specific courses of action, to negotiate? Since 2016, Berlin policy makers have developed an urban strategy to combat real estate price increases and gentrification. Another challenge for Berlin is to adapt to demographic change and the growing number of tourists. More participative, more equitable, and less favourable to automobiles, this city is looking to incorporate diverse methods: public/private partnership, citizen awareness initiatives, social and economic actions. This book aims to explore Berlin’s ability not to trivialise new ideas and thus remain a leader in innovation. The identified processes and the paradoxes deriving from them are likely to call into question the methods and current strategies of other European cities.