maart 2016

The world is undergoing the largest wave of urban growth in history, bringing huge social, economic and environmental transformations. Urbanization has the potential to usher in a new era of well-being, resource efficiency and economic growth. But cities are also home to high concentrations of poverty. Nowhere is the rise of inequality clearer than in urban areas, where wealthy communities coexist alongside, and separate from, slums and informal settlements. The face of inequality is increasingly even in our Western cities. Too many urban residents grapple with extreme poverty, exclusion, vulnerability and marginalization.

Within urban transitions there is far more fluidity in relationships where the knowledge is flowing within, across and between organizations, people, economics. The boundaries are blurring, that increasing fuzziness needs shifting our style of decision-making and solution finding. Urban development closely resembles the recent past, relying on existing models to determine appropriate actions and investments is rational. Struggling with the dominant linear logic constrains innovation, restricts to provide radically different urban transition and limits our abilities to change fast enough. Creating that nagging feeling of relentless destruction or disturbance, the very opposite of the stable equilibrium of the past. Cities that…

Cities at all stages of development are exposed to increasing economic and environmental pressures and instabilities associated with globalization, urbanization, biophysical limits and ecological boundaries and resource depletion. Cities will need to plan and manage  for enduring supply of services in dynamic urban systems affected by global changes. These hazards are often difficult to anticipate and may interact in ways that amplify their consequences. The global financial crisis has in many places ushered in a period of austerity, heightening the risks of adversity for urban citizens and governments, making it difficult for them to cope with these kinds of unexpected…

The world is urbanizing at a breakneck pace, this urban revolution is mesmerizing. But all cities are becoming more instable and fragile. The intensity of their fragility, however, varies considerably across time and space. Some cities are affected by acute fragility and are close to collapse. Others are also at risk, albeit to a lesser degree. Even our modern cities like Amsterdam, London, New York, Paris, and Tokyo are not immune. In the decades to come, the city, not the state, will decide stability and development. People around the world have been converging on cities for centuries, and more than half of…