Urban Change and the European Left looks at the way politicians and critics use the city to ground their political messages. The book explores local narratives of urban change through ethnography, biography, travelogue, and social history. Drawing on novels, architectural commentaries, urban plans, political speeches, history and autobiography, Urban Change and the European Left provides accounts of public art, architecture, grassroots struggles, battles for control of the 1992 Olympics, and the city and Catalan identity.