Neoliberal metropolitanism and the remaking of welfare systems: The rise of professional projects in the government of the biopolitics of the metropolis

European research on the linkages between professionalization and political systems has focused either on the role of the state in professional projects or, more recently, on the relevance of transnational developments for a globalisation of professions. This paper extends the analysis of political systems to a new scale, that of the metropolis, identifying the recent discourse of metropolises as ‘landscapes of power’ in global economy as a meta-level turn to ‘neoliberal metropolitanism’ in public policy. The paper further argues that the new discourse has helped to constitute metropolises also as important landscapes for professional projects.

The analysis examines urban planning focusing on the Greater Helsinki region as ‘a world-class centre for business and innovation’, focusing on the professional projects that rise in the intersection of government and scientific expertise. I employ Patrick Carroll’s ideas about how the role of scientific expertise for ‘material design’ as conducted by political systems. Carroll highlights how the key boundary objects of land, people and built environment are transformed into ‘techno-territoriality’, ‘bio-population’, and ‘infrastructural jurisdiction’. Employing Carroll’s framework to my analysis of role of expertise for the biopolitics of the metropolis, I argue that expert professionals are key agents of this transformation work, forging expert knowledge into institutional practice.

The findings show that like the old liberal state that gave rise to new sciences such as public health the market-conscious metropolis also supports expert projects anchored in the public sector. The reported analysis of policy documents finds four expert professional projects:  innovation policy and innovation professionals; new public management and efficiency professionals; transnational human resource management and recruitment professionals; and integration policy and diversity management professionals.