High Point, North Carolina, once known as the “Home Furnishings Capital of the World” for its vast manufacturing complex, has suffered intense deindustrialization over the past 60 years. During this same time, however, High Point has competed with much more prominent cities to become the world's most important furniture exposition node and a major design, fashion, and merchandising center. Exploiting its inexpensive real estate—what amounts to a planetary rent gap—and its furniture design heritage, city leaders have aggressively offered the furniture world unprecedented control over its downtown landscape for the twice–annual exposition. Over the past 35 years, however, there have also been growing efforts to combat the domination of the city by exchange value considerations privileged by outside real estate interests such as private equity firms Bain and Blackstone. This article documents, first, the loss of a resident–centered downtown to the pursuit of exchange values and, second, the mobilizations to reclaim resident–centered use values. As it does, it interrogates what the High Point case can teach us about the small city in the quickly transforming global context.

中文翻译：

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大城市问题：小城市的私募股权投资、跨国用户和本地动员

北卡罗来纳州海波因特因其庞大的制造综合体而一度被称为“世界家居之都”，但在过去 60 年中经历了强烈的去工业化。然而，与此同时，High Point 与更多著名城市竞争，成为世界上最重要的家具博览会节点和主要的设计、时尚和商品中心。利用其廉价的房地产（相当于全球租金差距）及其家具设计传统，城市领导人积极为家具界提供对其市中心景观的前所未有的控制权，以举办两年一度的博览会。然而，在过去的 35 年里，也有越来越多的努力通过交换价值考虑来对抗城市的统治权，这些考虑因素受到私募股权公司贝恩和黑石等外部房地产利益的青睐。本文首先记录了以居民为中心的市中心因追求交换价值而丧失，其次记录了恢复以居民为中心的使用价值的动员。在此过程中，它询问了 High Point 案例可以告诉我们关于快速变化的全球环境中的小城市的哪些方面。