Globalizing Cities: a New Spatial Order

THE EDITORS OF this new volume in Blackwell’s series on ‘Studies in Urban and Social Change’ do not hold globalisation in awe, but they do take it seriously. Is globalisation imposing a new spatial order on cities? No, but it does tend to reinforce certain spatially structured inequalities. Are cities powerless in the face of these growing inequalities? No, but it will take more than spatial planning to counter them.

The hypothesis that globalisation is creating a new spatial order in cities, summarised in the editors’ introductory chapter, is based on a particular reading of largely American experiences. The more nuanced conclusions, summarised in the editors’ final chapter, draw on the more diverse set of experiences described by the contributors. But even the American experience is found to be less than straightforward.
Most of the contributors’ chapters explore the consequences of globalisation for spatial inequalities in specific cities: Calcutta, Rio de Janeiro, Singapore, Tokyo, New York, Brussels, and Frankfurt. Taken together they provide indications of both some of the common forces at work, and their often very different manifestations. There are also chapters examining the historical continuities in cities (arguing that the emergence of the ‘postmodern’ city has been oversold), the threats to European cities originating from the United States, and the impact of economic and political restructuring on Australian cities.

The contributors include geographers, planners and sociologists, most of whom would seem to have common interest in urban political economy. Despite the varied perspectives and opinions of the authors, they have sufficient common ground to allow the reader to draw his or her own conclusions about the challenges that globalisation poses.