"Fifty years after the publication of, The Death and Life of Great American Cities, Jane Jacobs is perhaps the most widely read urbanist ever. Her ideas contributed to the wholesale transformation of contemporary planning. This book reminds us of the full range and complexity of her work and offers thoughtful critiques on the consequences of her ideas for cities and planning today"--Back cover.

Includes bibliographical references (pages 161-179) and index.

Introduction : more than meets the eye / Max Page -- The unknown Jane Jacobs : geographer, propagandist, city planning idealist / Peter L. Laurence -- An Australian Jane Jacobs / Jane M. Jacobs -- The literary craft of Jane Jacobs / Jamin Creed Rowan -- Urban warfare : the battles for Buenos Aires / Sergio Kiernan -- The magpie and the bee : Jane Jacobs's magnificent obsession / Richard Harris -- Jane Jacobs in Dutch cities and towns : metropolitan romance in provincial reality / Gert-Jan Hospers -- Time, scale, and control : how New Urbanism (mis)uses Jane Jacobs / Jill L. Grant -- Planning the modern Arab city : the case of Abu Dhabi / Rudayna Abdo and Geoffrety M. Batzel -- Jane Jacobs, Andy Warhol, and the kind of problem a community is / Timothy Mennel -- A Chinese perspective / Nathan Cherry -- Jane Jacobs and the death and life of American planning / Thomas J. Campanella.