Urban Governance In Transition

This book offers readers a comprehensive introduction to the functions of the government in contemporary China. Further, it creates a framework to describe urban governance in today's China, which consists of four basic modes: the omnipotent government mode, autonomous governance mode, integrated governance mode and cooperative governance mode. The book defines a "city" as a gathering place for high-quality public service resources, and the basic task of urban governance is to provide high-quality public services and maintain the sustainability of fiscal revenues. By focusing on current "hot topics" in urban governance in China, including the institutional development of urban governance, model interpretation, city/county relationship, cross-border governance, cross-sectoral coordination, street management, community service provision, and municipal performance evaluation, it clarifies a number of common misunderstandings in the field of urban management and practice. Lastly, the book analyses the current integrated governance model used in Chinese cities, which relies on the authority of the government and integrates the market and social subjects across borders by means of qualification identification, resource support, elite absorption, party-group embeddedness, and project cooperation. However, this model is currently facing several problems. In order to address the potential risks of integrated governance, the book argues that we need to develop new institutional arrangements based on collaborative governance.

This is an up-to-date and topical treatment of how six major cities in Europe, North America and Asia are coping with the new demands on urban government. Population expansion, the migration of new peoples and disparities between cities and suburbs are longstanding features of the urban crisis. Today, city governments also face demands for popular participation and better public services while they struggle to position themselves in the new world economy. While each of the cities is located in its unique historical setting, the emphasis of the book is upon the common dilemmas raised by major planning problems and the search for more suitable approaches to governance and citizen involvement. A principal theme is the re-engineering of institutional structures designed to foster local responsiveness and popular participation. The discussion is set in the context of the globalizing forces that have impacted to different degrees, at different times, upon London, Tokyo, Toronto, Berlin, Hyderabad and Atlanta. Cities in Transition is a major and original addition to the comparative literature on urban governance.

Cities, the world over, are increasingly recognised to be both a principal source of the environmental and social sustainability challenges facing contemporary society and a critical site for addressing these challenges. Socio-technical systems are at the heart of these challenges as they configure central aspects of urban life: from mobility and energy infrastructures to leisure activities and patterns of mobility. This observation has led to substantial interest in how societies might initiate and actively steer radical transitions in these systems in the pursuit of sustainable urban futures. This book contributes to emerging debates on the politics of urban transitions by examining the intimate interlinkages between knowledge, power and governance. Drawing upon real-world examples of urban governance, the authors explore the strategies, struggles and controversies involved in configuring knowledge and how knowledge constructions influence governance by rendering some concerns and issues visible and valuable, while obscuring others. The book draws attention to how novel ways of conceptualising, knowing and observing socio-technical systems may be harnessed productively in redefining the power relationships underpinning unsustainable practices. Understanding these dynamics can ultimately inform and enable new approaches to support much-needed urban transitions. This book provides a compelling examination of urban knowledge politics for the twenty-first century that will be of great value to academics, policy-makers and practitioners working in the social sciences, urban studies, geography, urban governance or sustainability transitions.

Reading this book will lead to new insights compelling to an international audience into how cities address the sustainability challenges they face. They do this by not repeating old patterns but by searching for new and innovative methods and instruments based on shared principles of a transitions approach. The book describes the quest of cities on two continents to accelerate and stimulate such a transition to sustainability. The aim of the book is twofold: to provide insights into how cities are addressing this challenge conceptually and practically, and to learn from a comparison of governance strategies in Europe and Asia. The book is informed by transition thinking as it was developed in the last decade in Europe and as it is increasingly being applied in Asia. The analytical framework is based on principles of transition management, which draws on insights from complexity science, sociology, and governance theories. Only recently this approach has been adapted to the urban context, and this book is an opportunity to share these experiences with a wider audience. For scholars this work offers a presentation of recent state-of-the-art theoretical developments in transition governance applied to the context of cities. For urban planners, professionals, and practitioners it offers a framework for understanding ongoing developments as well as methods and instruments for dealing with them. The content is potentially appealing to post-graduate and graduate students of environmental management, policy studies, and urban studies programs.

This is an up-to-date and topical treatment of how six major cities in Europe, North America and Asia are coping with the new demands on urban government. Population expansion, the migration of new peoples and disparities between cities and suburbs are longstanding features of the urban crisis. Today, city governments also face demands for popular participation and better public services while they struggle to position themselves in the new world economy. While each of the cities is located in its unique historical setting, the emphasis of the book is upon the common dilemmas raised by major planning problems and the search for more suitable approaches to governance and citizen involvement. A principal theme is the re-engineering of institutional structures designed to foster local responsiveness and popular participation. The discussion is set in the context of the globalizing forces that have impacted to different degrees, at different times, upon London, Tokyo, Toronto, Berlin, Hyderabad and Atlanta. Cities in Transition is a major and original addition to the comparative literature on urban governance.

Exploring how urban professionals plan, manage and govern cities in emerging economies, this insightful book studies the actions and instruments they employ. It highlights how the paradigms of interventions and approaches to urban management are shifting, indicating that urban governance is becoming increasingly important in dealing with wicked issues, like climate change and social and economic inequalities in cities.

This is a unique book that provides rich knowledge on how to understand and actively contribute to urban sustainability transitions. The book combines theoretical frameworks and tools with practical experiences on transition management as a framework that supports urban planning and governance towards sustainability. The book offers the opportunity to become actively engaged in working towards sustainable futures of cities. Readers of this book will be equipped to understand the complexity of urban sustainability transitions and diagnose persistent unsustainability problems in cities. Urban planners and professionals will build competences for designing transition management processes in cities and engaging with multidisciplinary knowledge in solution-seeking processes. The heart of the book marks the variety of very different local case studies across the world – including, amongst others, Rotterdam in the Netherlands, La Botija in Honduras, Sydney in Australia and Cleveland in the US. These rich studies give inspiration and practical insights to young planners on how to create sustainable urban futures in collaboration with other stakeholders. The case studies and critical reflections on applications of transition management in cities offer food for thought and welcome criticism. They also introduce new lenses to understand the bigger picture that co-creation dynamics play in terms of power, (dis-)empowerment, legitimacy and changing actor roles. This will equip the readers with a deep understanding of the dynamics, opportunities and challenges present in urban contexts and urban sustainability transitions.

This book enhances the reader’s understanding of the theoretical foundations, sociotechnical assemblage, and governance mechanisms of sustainable smart city transitions. Drawing on empirical evidence stemming from existing smart city research, the book begins by advancing a theory of sustainable smart city transitions, which forms bridges between smart city development studies and some of the key assumptions underpinning transition management and system innovation research, human geography, spatial planning, and critical urban scholarship. This interdisciplinary theoretical formulation details how smart city transitions unfold and how they should be conceptualized and enacted in order to be assembled as sustainable developments. The proposed theory of sustainable smart city transitions is then enriched by the findings of investigations into the planning and implementation of smart city transition strategies and projects. Focusing on different empirical settings, change dimensions, and analytical elements, the attention moves from the sociotechnical requirements of citywide transition pathways to the development of sector-specific smart city projects and technological innovations, in particular in the fields of urban mobility and urban governance. This book represents a relevant reference work for academic and practitioner audiences, policy makers, and representative of smart city industries. The chapters in this book were originally published as a special issue of the Journal of Urban Technology.