Urban space is a commons simultaneously a sphere of human cooperation & negotiation & its product Understanding urban space as a commons means that the much sought-after productivity of the city precedes rather than results from strategies of the state & capital This approach challenges assumptions of urbanization as capital-driven an idea which resonates with a range of recent urban social movements from the Arab Spring & the Occupy movement to the Right to the City alliance However commons exist in a tense relationship with state & market both of which continually seek to exploit & control them Initiatives to create commons are welcomed & even facilitated by governments in order to (re-)valorize urban space & lessen the impacts of economic restructuring while at the same time the creative & reproductive potential of the urban commons is undermined by continuing attempts to commodify them This volume examines these topics theoretically & empirically through a wide spectrum of international case studies providing perspectives from a variety of cities as diverse as Berlin Hyderabad & Seoul A wider discussion of commons in current scientific & activist literature from housing public space to urban infrastructure is explored through the lens of the urban condition