Rethinking Global Urbanism

"A great collection that takes us to the next phase of global urbanism. The editors forcefully argue for the need to incorporate variables that have been mostly neglected in the extant research in this field, or are only now emerging. This opens up challenging new analytic ground."—Saskia Sassen, Columbia University, author of Territory, Authority, Rights, USA

"This volume marks a novel, even radical departure from the literature on global cities. Previous scholarship has tended to focus on a few global cities that act as financial and command centers. This volume is a departure because it takes seriously the idea that global processes are at work in cities of all sizes and in all regions of the world. In sum it offers an imaginative rethinking, just as the title promises." —Dennis R. Judd, Interim Director, Great Cities Institute Professor, Department of Political Science University of Illinois at Chicago, USA

"Rethinking Global Urbanism travels through an array of cities less often explored by urban scholars and along the way develops and reworks many significant themes in the field. The book sets the scene for inventing new approaches to cities which refuse old categorisations and demand instead that we think cities like San Francisco and Shenzhen, Tunis and Detroit, together. Historically astute but with an eye to the future of cities, this volume attends to themes such as economy and culture, governance and globalisation through wonderfully detailed city case studies but with a clear ambition to informing wider theoretical debates. This collection is an important contribution to the emerging body of work in global comparative urbanism."—Jennifer Robinson, University College London, UK

Rethinking Global Urbanism offers vibrant, refreshing dialogues about cities in a shifting global web. Going beyond the sprawling iconic metropolitan nodes that generally have dominated social science theory and analyses, the authors add complexities and shadows to diverse case studies from Johannesburg, Dubai, Shenzhen, Salvador, Detroit, San Francisco, Puttrajaya and Tianjin. Analyses range from the trajectories of emergent, even "instant" world capitals to the strategies of older cities staving off decline; these are the cities of the future as well as the cities next door. Throughout the text, the authors bring globalization alive, whether in protests over gentrification in Brazil, the meanings of a cup of coffee at a mixed Tunisian café, the transnational politics dividing Chinatown or the ruminations surrounding the closing of a Rustbelt factory. At the same time, these multidisciplinary perspectives, carefully anchored in place, history and people, expose critical linkages among cities that challenge simple models of global hierarchy, identifying worlds within worlds that shape important urban connections. This is a collection that should enliven classroom discussions and spur many scholars to think about richer meanings of globalization across multiple, changing cities of the 21st century.—Gary W. McDonogh, Growth and Structure of Cities, Bryn Mawr College, usa