The recent riots in London show that the politics of changing the structure that exploded into violent confrontations between the state and the people in the past is giving way to the predominance of inter-ethnic and inter-religious tensions on the one hand, and acquisitive individualism on the other. The riots have to be located against the backdrop of the socio-economic changes that London has undergone during the last few decades. The metropolis has turned into a megalopolis - a globalised urban system that has expanded through the territorial appropriation of suburbs into the megastructure, based on flows of multinational goods and services, investments and information technology, and immigration of human resources.