Geography - Cities, sustainability, globalisation and risk Flashcards
What is the contemporary urban world?
Urban world is a heterogeneous place, with intra and inter-regional differences
China is hugely significant – 682 million of the world’s urban population are there.
UN projects that China and India will account for about 1/3 of the coming increase in the urban population
What are some facts about population regarding the contemporary urban world?
Most of the world’s urban population live in small to medium sized cities
Much of the world’s population live in cities with fewer than 500,000 inhabitants
Points of linkage between town and country but integrated into national and global systems
What are mega cities?
These are cities with populations of over 10 million.
UN found that today Asia has 13 megacities, Latin America has four, and Africa, Europe and Northern America have two each.
What is urban growth and urbanisation?
Urban growth=absolute increase in size of urban population
Urbanisation= the relative shift in population distribution from rural areas into town and cities
Urban growth and urbanisation are relatively recent….
What is the interdependency theory of global urban development?
Urbanisation in core and periphery are inter-related
Global urban development is a consequence of 2 linked processes:
changes in wealth accumulation
the evolution of a world system of nations
What are the four changes in wealth accumulation?
Mercantilism
Industrial capitalism (colonialism/imperialism)
Monopoly capitalism (state imperialism)
Transnational corporate capitalism (corporate imperialism)
What is Mercantilism?
1500-1780
Main sources of wealth were trade in commodities
Urban development focused on European ports, like Venice, Genoa, Amsterdam
Urban development very limited
Role of periphery was supply of agricultural goods and raw materials
Settlement patterns focused on coasts
What is Industrial Capitalism?
1780-1880
Britain at forefront of industrial revolution
Growth of cities like London, Manchester, Glasgow and Dundee
What is Monopoly Capitalism?
1880-1950
Focus is North west Europe, North America and coasts of empires
Dominant cities are London and New York
What is Corporate Capitalism?
1950 onwards
Rise of the transnational corporation
Investment by global capitalists in selected cities
Displacement of rural populations
State contrasting views of geographers on the links between globalisation and the city… pessimism versus optimism.
David Harvey: globalisation has led to a reactionary, place-based politics
Doreen Massey: globalization has lead to a progressive local politics of place
What is a “pessimistic” reading of globalisation for cities? (Part 1)
Changes in mobility of production mean cities are under threat from the restructuring of economic relations at a global level.
Urban infrastructure is a form of fixed capital which exists in tension with other forms of mobile capital.
Mobility leads to place investment and disinvestment.
Old places have to be devalued, destroyed and redeveloped, new places are created: the cathedral city becomes a heritage centre, the mining community become a ghost town, the old industrial centre is deindustrialised
What is a “pessimistic” reading of globalisation for cities? (Part 2)
Globalization is seen as something anxiety provoking for those who seek to invest in the fixities of a place based existence.
Harvey’ s view is that the city can be something reactionary, exclusive.
The city is an immobile connection between a group of people and a site
The city is implicated in debates about us (people who belong in a place) and them (people who do not).
What is a consequence of globalisation for cities?
City competition at global level.
What is an optimistic reading for globalisation for cities?
Massey develops a progressive global sense of place
Globalised cities are about combining objects, things, thoughts in new kinds of ways….
The walk down her main shopping street in North London is a celebration of diversity and hybridity
This does not mean a complete acceptance of globalisation, but a total rejection would be just as uncritical
What strategies should cities pursue in an era of globalisation?
Locational strategies: economic growth model focused on the costs of land, labour and capital (inspired by Peterson’s (1981) City Limits thesis)
World class community orientations: gaining a niche in the global economy…
Entrepreneurial mercantilism: ‘to grow what we have, to expand what we have’
Asset-based human capital strategies: local job creation, education and training
Sustainable development: recycling, pollution reduction, growth management, community health
Or different strategies altogether?
What is the new global economic order?
Key changes in manufacturing: shift from core to periphery
A new international division of labour
But requires a new pattern of international finance: the global financial system
Still transnational corporate capitalism, or something beyond that?
What are socio-economic consequences of global urban development?
Where does responsibility for dealing with problems lie: with developing or developed world?
Urbanisation leads to development of an informal sector (generally illegal, but separate from the criminal economy). 1/3 to 1/2 of output
Urbanisation leads to ‘shanty towns’
Issues re service provision
Health issues in urban development (and in comparison to more rural areas)
Environment and health
What is global finance characterised by?
Foreign direct investment: US$1.3 trillion in 2000 cf. US$94 billion in 1982
Institutional infrastructure: e.g. IMF, World Bank
This move both gives rise to – and is enabled by – internationalisation of production
Things will have changed a lot with the recent financial crisis (and may change further)
However, still a functioning global financial system that plays a role in many cities
What are the three E’s?
Environment
Equity
Economy
What is Environment?
Environment: what are the environmental consequences, good and bad, of redevelopment?
What is Equity?
Equity: how far does redevelopment contribute to a more equitable society by reducing socio-economic inequalities?
What is economy?
Economy: how does redevelopment allow economic growth in ways which minimize risks to the environment?
According to Haughton and Hunter 2003, what are the ecological principles?
Prevention is better than cure
Nothing stands alone
Minimize waste
Maximize the use of renewable and recyclable materials
What are the ecological principles?
Maintain and enhance requisite variety
Identify and respect local, regional and global environmental tolerances
Enhance environmental understanding through research
What are the social and economic principles?
Use of appropriate technology, materials and design
Create new indicators of economic and environmental wealth
Create new indicators of economic and environmental productivity
Establish acceptable minimum standards through regulatory control
Continue action to internalise environmental costs into the market
Ensure social acceptability of environmental policies
Widespread public participation
What are management principles?
Subsidiarity
Flexibility in devising and implementing environmental policy regimes
Long term strategies are necessary for environmental management
Improved coordination across environment-related policies
Non-discrimination and equal right of hearing
Need for better availability and understanding of environmental information
What are plans for sustainability in European cities?
Green urbanism: compact and ecological urban form
Sustainable mobility
Building pedestrian cities
Greening the urban environment
Renewable energy and closed-loop cities
What city can be used as an example for planning for sustainability in America?
Seattle
How does the sustainable indicators project used in Seattle help environment & population and resources?
Environment:
biodiversity, air quality, soil erosion, and open space
Population and resources:
solid waste produced; vehicle mile travelled, residential water consumption, renewable energy use
How does the sustainable indicators project used in Seattle help economy & youth and education?
Economy (housing affordability, real unemployment, health care expenditure, distribution of personal income, percentage of children living in poverty)
Youth and education (adult literacy, juvenile crime rate, ethnic diversity of teaches, volunteer involvement in schools)
How does the sustainable indicators project used in Seattle help health and community?
Health and community (low birth weights asthma hospitalization, gardening activity, voter participation, neighbourliness, perceived quality of life).
Is sustainable urban development an oxymoron?
The Sears Tower in Chicago uses more energy in 24 hrs than an average American city of 150K or an Indian City of more than 1 million people
Why does Sears (Willis) Tower use more energy in 24 hrs than an average American city of 150K?
Tallest building in world (until 1998)
Still tallest in US
Skyscrapers consume a lot of electricity because water has to be pumped to the highest occupied floors
Reliance on mechanical (forced) ventilation.
Use of elevators instead of stairs
Natural lighting can not be used in ‘interior’ rooms such as elevators, bathrooms and stairwells.
Taipei 101 said to be world’s ‘greenest’ skyscraper
What is ecological footprint analysis?
Ecological footprint analysis is an accounting tool that enables us to estimate resource consumption and waste
Provides measure of human demand on earth’s ecosystems
A tool to ask (among other things):
how much does study population depend on resources from elsewhere
how much does it depend on waste assimilation capacity of global commons?
Will nature’s productivity be able to satisfy material expectations of growing human population?
What is Biosphere II?
In 1989, 1.27 hectare structure in Arizona, USA,
‘closed system’ but energetically open:
all components needed to maintain life sealed within the structure: animals and photosynthetic plants
the wastes of one organism were the nutrients of other organisms, in an unending cycle of matter
Individuals in the Biosphere 2 experiment had to survive on an ecological footprint of 0.16 hectares each, on what was essentially a pre-industrial lifestyle.
Cost of self-sustaining closed system exceeded US$200 million.
What is the downside to ecological footprint analysis?
The average ‘earthshare’ is 1.92ha (the amount of land required to support a person on this planet within the total amount of productive land)
If everyone in the world lived like the population in Scottish cities, we would need 2-4 additional earth’s to support global demand
Think critically about quantification and calculation
What is included and excluded? And how might this be different?
Can everything relevant here be quantified?
Political implications and use of this approach (both positive and negative)
Can it be equitable for some to have access to more or less than an equal ‘share’?
What is Ecological modernization and the city?
By introducing ecological criteria into production and consumption processes it will be possible to reduce resource consumption and pollution to sustainable levels
The market economy is often viewed as the most efficient and flexible way of achieving the objective of sustainability
Emphasises (as Mol and Sonnenfeld argue): Science and technology Market’s increasing importance Transformations in nation-state Changes in social movements Changes in discourse and ideology
What is Ecological modernization and the city? (2)
The market economy retains a key role
The enabling role of the state providing a regulatory framework for environmental protection
Emphasis on other stakeholders
What are criticisms for Ecological modernization and the city?
It is a Northern approach to the problem
The approach is restricted and narrow
The approach is optimistic
It assumes a consensual approach
It is largely devoid of a social dimension
Assumes the market and the state are in a compatible relationship
What is the radical perspective?
A radical perspective would argue that the market has failed and that economic growth is a cause of environmental degradation and social inequality
Radicals would emphasise that capitalist relations have created the inequalities which are part of the problem
What are radical perspectives?
Beck (1995) Risk Society: ‘we are confronted by the challenges of the self-created possibility … of the self-destruction of all life on earth’
Harvey (1996) ‘The environment of justice’: ‘Changing patterns of urban organization…. produce multiple displacements of environmental issues to different scales’
What did Harvey emphasise about the radical perspective?
Social relations as an explanation for environmental change;
Social justice as a way to achieve environmental justice within cities
Must embrace the idea of a welfare state (state-society relations) rather than just an enabling state (state-economy relations)
what is The work of David Harvey:
‘The environment of justice’?
The challenge for environmental movements is not just to confront the problem of environmental degradation but to transform the processes that gave rise to the problem in the first place
i.e. tackle the problem of unrelenting capital accumulation and the asymmetries of power and money and look at alternative modes of production, consumption and distribution (in Merrifield and Swyngedouw (1996) The Urbanization of Injustice)
