This edition first published 2017
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Cover image: 123ArtistImages/Gettyimages
For Julia and Lucy
This book begins with a simple premise: if the 20th century was defined by the nation state, our current century will be one driven by global cities. Beneath this observation, however, lies a complex web of implications for leaders across the world and across levels of government and society. In this insightful book, the authors show how adaptive nation states, in partnership with dynamic world cities, point the way towards a shared global future.
In response to the rising role of cities, we need to rethink the traditional arrangements of power between nations and regions. As responsibility shifts downwards, we need to reimagine the roles of legacy institutions that were intended to mediate between countries and invent new institutions that connect and empower cities. And as these global cities expand, we need to ensure that prosperity does not come at the expense of sustainability and equity.
Accelerating urbanisation is a natural response to trends in the global economy. International trade encourages specialisation, which, in turn, rewards agglomeration. By clustering skilled workers and similar types of industrial activity, cities and regions become more innovative and more productive. And despite predictions to the contrary, the benefits of proximity in both manufacturing and services have only increased from new technologies, thanks to everything from shortened product cycles and rapid prototyping to increased demand for customisation.
Still, these very forces of concentration, globalisation and connectivity that are causing the emergence of global cities are also creating challenges within them. Their rise in prosperity can also often come at the expense of secondary cities, increasing inequality across places. As economic hubs, they become magnets for migration, leading to challenges around settlement and integration. And cities that grow too fast or whose growth is too ungoverned often can develop in inefficient and unsustainable ways.
In many parts of the world, governance at the city level is showing it can innovate much more quickly than national governments, and these innovations are being shared and adapted by agile networks of global cities. But the message of this book is that global cities and nation states share a mutual interest in inventing solutions to the problems of our new urban century, and giving cities the tools to implement them at scale. Nation states therefore still have a pivotal role to play. There are a number of areas – national defense, international trade and the social safety net – where national governments must continue to set the rules and provide a stable environment. They also remain the most important source of long‐term and large‐scale investments in basic research, setting the platform for an innovative economy. But within a host of other policy areas, the best role for national governments is to be a partner – allowing their global cities the flexibility to customise solutions to their distinct challenges.
The rise of world cities in the global economy is not disappearing anytime soon. This reality demands a re‐evaluation of how cities relate to their respective nations and to each other. These pages offer that valuable analysis – including both a look at the current variation of government systems across the world and a perspective on what cities need moving forward.
This book has grown out of an initial study that was prepared for the Moscow Urban Forum in 2014. We wanted to inform the global discussion about the ways in which nation states were adjusting to the globalisation of major cities. The debate within nations about the role of their largest and most globally oriented cities varies hugely from one country to another. In some countries this is almost a national obsession, with continuous argument about whether having a global city is a net advantage or disadvantage. In some other countries the debate is almost totally absent, with either complete invisibility or complete acceptance of the global roles of major cities.
For the original study we consulted numerous books and academic journal articles to capture the latest insight into how the rise of world cities is changing government structures in nation states, and how both city and national governments are adapting to the new balance of power. We reviewed prominent contemporary books written in Europe, Asia and North America, and drew from the most recent findings of the World Bank, OECD and relevant international financial institutions.
For this book we identified 12 major world cities that reflected a range of geographic locations, constitutional structures, city statuses and development stages. Together these 12 cities’ GDP exceeds $7 trillion, accounting for roughly a tenth of global GDP. We gradually built up 12 case studies, drawing on recently published books, academic journals, independent media, international benchmarks and local studies and reports.
The ideas and arguments for this book evolved through extensive consultation with current and former senior members of city governments, and with national officials with responsibility for urban policy. Our research also engaged with political science and urban development experts in each of the 12 cities, as well as with business leadership organisations in many of the 12 cities.
We are very grateful to the following individuals who gave us their time and wisdom:
With special thanks to Emily Moir for her support in preparing the text and in enabling us to complete the project. With thanks also to Jonathan Couturier, Steve Howard and Dr Patrick Kilkelly for their invaluable research, insight and editing support. Responsibility for any errors is entirely our own.