How do racial capitalism, the politics of corporate branding, and the “shock doctrine” converge in the ongoing gentrification of Sunset Park, Brooklyn? Iman Maani explores this question in her first installment for “Glocal Dispatches,” our series focusing on how globalization impacts local communities.

As part of our Glocal Dispatches series, Nancy Lucier takes us to Block Island, Rhode Island, site of the first offshore wind farm in the United States. “This unique energy system embodies [Naomi] Klein’s hope of achieving community-controlled energy. I claim the concept of community-controlled energy promotes forward-looking models in the U.S., such as wind turbines challenging the dominant corporate view that fossil fuel is America’s primary source of energy.”

By Meca-Gaye Francis

“Interpersonal discrimination experienced by people like me is only a reflection of the power relations in the larger international system. Exploitation and discrimination are not novel. To say the very least, they characterize the nature of relationships in the international system and today manifest as forces of globalization in regions such as the Carribean.” In the latest installment of our Glocal Dispatches series, Meca-Gaye Francis explores the case of Jamaica, where the impact of emigration continues to reverberate in the space between colonialism and globalization.

By Eliza Maher

Though not a global city, Geneva, New York, located in the Finger Lakes region of the state, has become increasingly popular among tourists, entrepreneurs, culinary artists, and young, creative people. In the first installment of our new “Glocal Dispatches” series, Eliza Maher critically analyzes the revitalization of Geneva into a city driven by local businesses, art, music, Hobart and William Smith colleges, and Seneca Lake, and explores the shift to an image-saturated society. However, the shift, often characterized as positive, innovative, and diverse, fails to acknowledge the influence the urban branding will have on the minority groups in Geneva who cannot afford the lifestyle driven by localism.