Felix Adisson

Bio

My research lies in the field of urban political economy, focusing on the interplay between urban development and the restructuring of the state and capitalism. My work has particularly contributed to research on the financialization of urban production and public land, as well as the framing of urban policies and politics by fiscal consolidation policies.

As a host of the Centre national de la recherche scientifique (2023–2025), I am currently analyzing urban development policies and the transformations of city governance in Fortaleza (Northeast Brazil). Through this lens, I address the themes of the urban and political effects of the growth of middle and upper-middle classes in the Global South, as well as the relationships between science, philanthropy, and urban politics in a peripheral metropolis.

An Associate Professor at the École d’Urbanisme de Paris, I teach institutional frameworks and the political economy of urban production, along with a hands-on urban planning studio. I also offer an introductory course in urban sociology in the Humanities and Social Sciences Department at the Université Gustave Eiffel.

I hold a doctorate from Université Paris-Est and Politecnico di Milano (joint supervision, 2015). I previously served as a Temporary Lecturer in Sociology at Université Paris-Est Marne-la-Vallée (2014–2016) and completed a postdoctoral fellowship as a Polimi International Fellow (Politecnico di Milano, 2016–2017). I have been a visiting professor at Universidade Federal Fluminense (2021) and a visiting researcher at Universidade Federal do Ceará (2023–2024), both in Brazil.

My research has been published in Regional Studies, Urban Studies, European Urban and Regional Studies, Finance & Space, Espaces et Sociétés, Economy & Society, Cybergeo, and Territorio.

Activities

“FinPlanet” research project led by Ludovic Halbert (Latts, CNRS), Lucia Shimbo (IAU, USP) and myself (funded by the French National Research Agency and FAPESP (PRCI programme), 2025–2028)

Research project “The expansion of global middle-class neighbourhoods in the Global South and the restructuring of governance in a peripheral metropolis: the case of Fortaleza in north-eastern Brazil” (support for international mobility from the CNRS’s INSHS, 2023 and 2024)

“INVEST” research project led by Latts and Lab’Urba at the University of Paris-Est (funding from the French National Research Agency, 2019–2023)

“Local Public Investment” (IPL) research project led by Latts and Lab’Urba (funded by the Caisse des dépôts et consignations, 2018–2020)

Member of the editorial board and responsible for book reviews (with Antoine Guironnet) for the journal *Métropoles*

Co-coordinator of the “PMMU” research strand at the Techniques, Territories and Societies Laboratory (with Emmanuelle Santoire and Pauline Gali, since January 2025)

Member of the editorial board of the National Foresight Programme for Urban Research (CNRS) (with Sabine Barles, Nathalie Blanc, Olivier Coutard, Leïla Frouillou and Fanny Rassat) (2016–2019).