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Paper short abstract:

In the context of infrastructural transformation, the role of maintenance and repair is often overlooked. Drawing on Hamburg's gas and water infrastructure, this paper emphasizes the ambiguity of these practices as transformative as well as sustaining, challenging narratives of innovation.

Paper long abstract:

We live in times of crisis. Ecological, economic, political, and social disruptions are shaping global society. The resulting uncertainty gives rise to an urgent need for action. Infrastructures lie at the core of many of these socio-ecological crises, and (technological) innovation is often discussed as an answer to these challenges. This focus neglects the importance of already existing structures, their durability, and thus resistance to rapid, radical change, particularly the role of maintenance and repair practices. On one hand, these practices counteract the constant decay of the material fabric and thereby enable the basic functioning of our society. On the other hand, as various authors in the social sciences and humanities have pointed out, these practices themselves have an inherent potential for transformation.

Drawing on insights from my PhD thesis on Hamburg's gas and water infrastructure in Germany, this paper aims to highlight the inherent ambiguity of maintenance and repair practices and processes. Rooted in geography but employing a methodology that combines participant observation, interviews, and archival research, the study demonstrates the role maintenance and repair play—both presently and historically—in the context of wider (infrastructural) transformation processes. Additionally, by employing theoretical frameworks developed in contexts of the “Global South” to analyze urban processes in the "Global North," this input contributes to ongoing discourses within postcolonial research on the globalization of concepts and theories.