Gauged Wess-Zumino-Witten actions for generalized Poincare algebras

If the Chern-Simons theory is the appropriate gauge theory for the gravitational interaction, then these theories must satisfy the correspondence principle, namely they must be related to General Relativity. In this Letter a five-dimensional Chern-Simons action invariant under the generalized Poincare algebra B-5 is constructed and then it is proved that the corresponding gauged Wess-Zumino-Witten term contains the Einstein-Hilbert action. In the same way, we show that a five-dimensional Chern-Simons action, invariant under the Maxwell algebra 934, induces a gauged Wess-Zumino-Witten term that coincides with the four-dimensional topological gravity. (C) 2014 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V.