A tour of New York’s gaudiest neighbourhood with the Marxist geographer David Harvey

The sleek high-rises in Manhattan’s Hudson Yards were built atop what was once a hub of industry. Today, argues the celebrated British American geographer David Harvey, they’re towering symbols of speculative wealth. In David Harvey and the City, he gives viewers a tour of this 21st-century redevelopment – not far from where he teaches at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York (CUNY) – and the New York beyond it. Harvey gives a Marxist perspective on how spaces like these reflect the deeper tensions inherent in capitalist systems, where urban design is increasingly shaped by financial interests rather than the wellbeing of communities. He suggests that, by changing how we value space – treating land not as a commodity but as part of a shared civic life – we could begin to imagine cities that prioritise people, not profit. Directed by the Canadian filmmaker Brett Story, the short documentary serves as both an accessible introduction to radical geography and a compelling invitation to rethink the modern city.