Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
Today, the world's cities face a range of challenges major spatial, economic, demographic, ecological, cultural and social challenges to the extent that a turning point has been reached. Widespread inequality and social exclusion on the one hand are opposed to a world where companies cluster and connect with start-ups, business incubators and accelerators on the other.
Planning and policy have good experience in handling this new built environment, but the real challenge for this post-urban-political world is to contribute to improved wellbeing by building social capital that secures urban social cohesion but is also directly connected to the physical realm where the drive is towards a compact, transit-accessible, and technically-wired blend of mixed-use housing, office, and retail environments.
Arguing from a range of different theoretical standpoints, methodological approaches and various perspectives, a stellar team of contributors, including some of the leading social scientists of the age, provide their take on the City of the coming years.
Synopsis
Winner of the Regional Studies Association's Best Book Award 2018.
In the last few decades, many global cities and towns have experienced unprecedented economic, social, and spatial structural change. Today, we find ourselves at the juncture between entering a post-urban and a post-political world, both presenting new challenges to our metropolitan regions, municipalities, and cities. Many megacities, declining regions and towns are experiencing an increase in the number of complex problems regarding internal relationships, governance, and external connections. In particular, a growing disparity exists between citizens that are socially excluded within declining physical and economic realms and those situated in thriving geographic areas. This book conveys how forces of structural change shape the urban landscape.
In The Post-Urban World is divided into three main sections: Spatial Transformations and the New Geography of Cities and Regions; Urbanization, Knowledge Economies, and Social Structuration; and New Cultures in a Post-Political and Post-Resilient World. One important subject covered in this book, in addition to the spatial and economic forces that shape our regions, cities, and neighbourhoods, is the social, cultural, ecological, and psychological aspects which are also critically involved. Additionally, the urban transformation occurring throughout cities is thoroughly discussed. Written by today's leading experts in urban studies, this book discusses subjects from different theoretical standpoints, as well as various methodological approaches and perspectives; this is alongside the challenges and new solutions for cities and regions in an interconnected world of global economies.
This book is aimed at both academic researchers interested in regional development, economic geography and urban studies, as well as practitioners and policy makers in urban development.