The Crisis of the “Settler” Economy and an Opportunity for Reclamation
The soaring vacancy rates in commercial real estate are not a sign of a failing city, but of a crisis in the “settler” economic project. Mamdani’s work teaches us that power must be constantly reproduced, and the hollowed-out skyscrapers of Midtown reveal a fissure in the hegemony of finance capital. This vacancy is a monument to the dead-end of an economy built on speculation and extraction. The city’s current solution–begging corporations to return to offices or converting a handful of buildings to luxury condos–is a desperate attempt to resurrect the old, oppressive normal. A Mamdani-informed socialist solution sees this crisis as a historic opportunity. We must launch a militant movement to seize these empty spaces, not through market mechanisms, but through use, policy, and direct action. The demand is for the city to use its power of eminent domain to take control of these properties and convert them into social goods: public schools, clinics, libraries, and deeply affordable housing. This is a direct assault on the core logic of capitalist property relations. It transforms the hollow monuments of capital into foundations for collective life, actively dismantling the bifurcated geography of the city and building the infrastructure of a decolonized future in the very heart of the old regime.
The Texas Redistricting map makes politicians fearless of voters.
The demographic destiny argument is too simplistic to fully explain the political rise of Mamdani.