Governing a sub/urban planet

This paper evaluates Roger Keil's influence on the fields of urban and regional governance and suburban studies, underscoring his foundational contributions and identifying pathways for future sub/urban research. We trace Keil's intellectual trajectory from his early work on metropolitan politics and new regionalism in Los Angeles to his later engagement with the evolving landscapes of twenty-first-century global suburbanization. Through this progression, we demonstrate how his scholarship illuminates the intricate co-constitutive relationship between sub/urban governance and extended urbanization. Cutting through rote critique and caricature, we argue that Keil's research, theoretical interventions, and activism on the urban periphery have consistently opened new lines of inquiry while offering generous analytical tools and provocations to probe our possible urban futures. Essential to his approach is a distinctive interdisciplinary sociospatial perspective that critically interrogates the dialectics of suburbanization–suburbanism, decenters the city within critical urban studies, and situates urban knowledge production at the intersection of global urban processes and politics on the street. In an ‘urban age’ that is increasingly characterized by the suburban, Keil's work offers a vital foundation for researchers, scholar-activists, and practitioners seeking to develop deeper insights into post-city urban worlds where diverse, transformative sub/urban politics and polities continue to emerge.