Contents 112
DossierLessons from the crisis
![Illustration © Eva Vázquez. A person looks at a painting of a ledger. The painting shows descending lines that emerge from the ledger and pierce through the ground.](https://www.barcelona.cat/metropolis/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/editorial-ilustracions_1100x548_4.jpg?itok=yYrKMlEE)
There are more poor people today, and they have even less than before the crisis. Organised citizenship has tackled this situation with social innovation and solidarity, but worsening...
![Illustration © Eva Vázquez. A number of people contemplate a temple with Greek columns. The column on the right is shaped like a dollar symbol.](https://www.barcelona.cat/metropolis/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/anton-costas01-ilustracions_1100x548_5.jpg?itok=6g4qO4F5)
Is capitalism compatible with democracy and prosperity? The rise in inequalities in the early 21st century has had worrying implications in liberal democracies, which are...
![Illustration © Eva Vázquez. A house split into four as if it were a cake and, in the middle, grows a tree full of vultures.](https://www.barcelona.cat/metropolis/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/jaime-palomera02-ilustracions_1100x548_13.jpg?itok=l8fo8QYw)
A decade after the worst real estate bubble in history burst, access to housing is still one of the major social problems. And it is because states operate as another cog in the...
![Illustration © Eva Vázquez. Residential neighborhood typical in the United States. There are some well-built houses with a pool while other houses are half-sunken in their pool.](https://www.barcelona.cat/metropolis/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/marga-leon01-ilustracions_1100x548_2.jpg?itok=R_ic2McL)
Europe’s economic reconstruction in the second half of the 20th century focussed on providing liberal democracies with institutions that would protect citizens’ social rights...
![Illustration © Eva Vázquez. A number of people climb the stairs of a building but cannot keep going because a flight of stairs between two floors has collapsed.](https://www.barcelona.cat/metropolis/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/jose-moises01-ilustracions_1100x548_1.jpg?itok=y5_u_yKO)
The economic crisis has widened the gaps (labour, generation, gender and fiscal) that contribute to exacerbating inequality. If societies continue to increase these divides and the...
![Illustration © Eva Vázquez. Two people are talking. One seems to tell the other about the house of his dreams: one bigger than the one he has.](https://www.barcelona.cat/metropolis/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/rosa-guillermo01-ilustracions_1100x548_10.jpg?itok=OqpXDDFk)
Economic inequality is conducive to individualism. Living in unequal societies makes us more concerned about our social position; the greater the difference, the further the distance...
![Illustration © Eva Vázquez. A group of people form the blade of a palette knife, a plasterer's tool used to apply cement.](https://www.barcelona.cat/metropolis/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/marisol-marc01-ilustracions_1100x548_7.jpg?itok=gzGTA112)
In the face of the post-crisis neoliberal siren calls, crying out for individual responsibility, civil society has organized itself to provide a collective response to the consequences...
Other contents
![Retrat de Fina Birulés © Camilla de Maffei](https://www.barcelona.cat/metropolis/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/entrevista-finabirules-portada-1100.jpg?itok=E9mgEhxa)
Fina Birulés
Distilling thought involves the strenuous task of condensing sense and syntactic skill. Those who know Fina Birulés know of her tenacious precision in thought and speech, a precision of...
![Portrait of Dominique Méda © Albert Armengol](https://www.barcelona.cat/metropolis/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/entransit-obertura-meda-1100.jpg?itok=UPp6UCd0)
Thinker of reference in the study of work, Méda impresses with her passionate, direct, documented and rigorous discourse in defence of work in general and of wage earners in particular,...
![Il·lustració de diferents llocs de Barcelona: Sagrada Família, Camp Nou, torre Agbar © Astrid Ortiz](https://www.barcelona.cat/metropolis/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/infografia_4.jpg?itok=gUQRtiY5)
Barcelona receives more than 12 million visitors per year for both business and pleasure. The city is the location of one out of every three tourism companies in Catalonia and almost...
![Houses on the street Carrer de la Font Florida, in the Barcelona neighborhood of Font de la Guatlla. © Arianna Giménez](https://www.barcelona.cat/metropolis/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/visions-fontguatlla-obertura-1100.jpg?itok=AukEB5wN)
Classed as green areas by the General Metropolitan Plan, the small neighbourhoods of Satalia and Font de la Guatlla have long lived under the threat of expropriation and demolition. In...
![Illustration © Eva Vázquez. A fish looks at its reflection in a fish tank from the outside. The inside the fish bowl features a cityscape and a boy on a bicycle.](https://www.barcelona.cat/metropolis/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/relat_1.jpg?itok=SqFi5v-H)
Debbie and Humbert got married on the same day that Ibiza died. Carla found the turtle with her head inside her shell and her legs stretched out. Her friends from handball had...
![© Laura Guerrero. Views of Barcelona from the sea to the mountains from Barcelona City Council's Novíssim building.](https://www.barcelona.cat/metropolis/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/plec-intro-obertura-1100.jpg?itok=szvQn2my)
Against the strength of the market, which spins people outside the city, culture can be a tool that helps them to overcome marginalities and puts them on equal footing without making...
![Older women singing while performing a choreography with their hands. © Laura Guerrero](https://www.barcelona.cat/metropolis/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/plec-debat-01-concert-obertura-1100.jpg?itok=2TPa2QcK)
If culture is to help us to create a community, the consumer of art must also be a participant and not a mere spectator. Participation enables us to broaden our point of view and...
![Llibre: Muñoz Ramonet. Retrat d’un home sense imatge, Manuel Risques (ed.)](https://www.barcelona.cat/metropolis/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/llibre-munozramonet.jpg?itok=GWp8OZ0c)
Julio Muñoz Ramonet, the invisible prince of the black market, left his palace on Carrer de Muntaner to the city of Barcelona, along with the extraordinary collection of art that hung...
![Book: Variacions profanes, Marta Pessarrodona](https://www.barcelona.cat/metropolis/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/llibre-visionsprofanes.jpg?itok=RVuH6UAc)
Coinciding with her distinction with the Premi d’Honor de les Lletres Catalanes 2019, Marta Pessarrodona (Terrassa, 1941) has just published Variacions profanes [Profane...
![Book: Novel·la, Pol Beckmann](https://www.barcelona.cat/metropolis/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/llibre-novelabeckmann.jpg?itok=RWNIMvWu)
The debut novel by young Pol Beckmann (Barcelona, 1991), that has received the Llibreter 2019 award in the category of other literatures, is a multi-faceted literary game.
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