GLOBAL CITY

REPORTERS:
Gorumba, Jose Jr. V. Menoza, Danica Pamel
Ignacio, Mariel Shen Levie, Magsayo
 Learning Objectives:

• Define global city

• Identify the attributes, criteria or
indicators of a global city
• Explain why globalization is a
spatial phenomenon
• Analyze how cities serves as
engines of globalization
DEFINITION
• also known as a power
city, world city, alpha city,
or world center.
• a city that serves as a
primary node in the global
economic network.
• Making sense of urban systems
and global networks
• The concept originates
from geography and
urban studies.
• represents the most
complex and significant hub
within the international
system, characterized by
links binding it to other cities
that have direct, tangible
effects on
global socioeconomic affairs
.
• New global have risen not
only as financial centers but
also a producers of services
that are global in scope.
• Global cities are post-
industrial.
• In the age of globalization,
activities of the production
are scattered on a global
basis.
HISTORY
• 1886 - The term world city or a city heavily involved
in global trade described by The Illustrated London
News
• 1915 - British sociologist and geographer Patrick
Geddes likewise used the term.
• Late 19th or early 20th century – The
term megacity entered and commonly used.
• In the 21st century - the various terms are usually
focused on a city's financial power and high
technology infrastructure, with other factors becoming
less relevant.
• Is a sociologist who
popularized the term “Global
City” in the 1990’s who
identified three global cities:
New York, London & Tokyo.
• Sassen’s concept of global
City gives emphasis on the
flow of information and
capital.
Saskia Sassen
The Criteria
Of A
Global City
New York London Tokyo
• include a high degree of urban development, a large
population,
• the presence of major multinational companies, a
significant and globalized financial sector,
• well developed and internationally linked
transportation & infrastructure,
• local or national economic dominance,
• high quality educational and research institutions, and
• a globally influential output of ideas, innovations, or
cultural products.
• Recent commentators have expanded the criteria that
Sassen used to determine what constitutes a global
city.
• Movie making Mecca Los Angeles can now rival Big
Apple’s cultural influence.
• San Francisco must now factor in as another global
city because it is the home of the most powerful
internet companies - Facebook, Twitter and Google
• The growth of the Chinese economy has turned cities
like Shanghai, Beijing and Guangzhou into centers
of trades and finance.
GLOBAL CITY
INDICATORS
Economic Power Economic
Competitiveness

Economic Opportunities
 Economic Power
-determines which cities are global
New York
China

Shanghai, Beijing and

Guangzhou
Economic Power Economic
Competitiveness

Economic Opportunities
 Economic Opportunities
-Make it attractive to talents across
the world.
Economic Power Economic
Competitiveness

Economic Opportunities
 Economic Competitiveness
• Criteria in market size, purchasing
power of citizens, size of the middle
class, and potential growth
• The “tiny” Singapore is considered
as Asia’s most competitive city
because of its strong market,
efficient and incorruptible
government, and livability.

Singapore
 Center of Authority
• state power

• It may not be as wealthy •Canberra is a sleepy town and

as New York, but it is the
seat of American state
power.
not attractive to tourists. But as
Australia’s political capital, it is
home to the country’s top
politicians, bureaucrats, and
policy advisors.

Washington, D.C. Canberra, Australia

 Political Influence

• Powerful political hubs exert influence on

their own countries as well on international
affairs.
 Political Influence

United Nations headquarters European Union headquarters

New York, City Brussels, Belgium
 Political Influence

ASEAN headquarters European Central Bank

headquarters
Jakarta, Indonesia Frankfurt, Germany
 Center of High Learning and Culture

• A city’s intellectual
influence is seen
through the
influence of its
publishing industry.
 Center of High Learning and Culture

Harvard University,
Boston

Australia
 Center of High Learning and Culture

• Singapore houses some of the

region’s top television stations and
news organizations (MTV Southeast
Asia and Channel News Asia)

• Its various art galleries and

cinemas also show paintings from
artists and filmmakers from Philippines
and Thailand.
 • Today, global cities
become culturally diverse.

Is Manila can be
considered as global?
Why study Global
Cities
&
The challenges of
Global Cities
 Why study Global Cities?

Globalization is spatial which means:

1. Globalization is spatial because it

occurs in physical spaces. More people
ar driven out of city centers to make
way for the new developments.
 Why study Global Cities?

Globalization is spatial which means:

2. Globalization is spatial because what

makes it move is the fact that it is
based in places.
 The Challenges of Global Cities

• Global Cities also have their undersides. They can

be sites of great inequality and poverty as well as
tremendous violence.

• Global cities create winners and losers.

 The Challenges of Global Cities

• Denser settlement patterns yiels energy savings;

apartment building for example, are more efficient
to heat and cool than detached suburban house.

• In cities with extensive public transportation

systems, people tend to drive less and thereby cut
carbon emissions.
 The Challenges of Global Cities

• Not all cities are as dense as New York or Tokyo.

Some cities like Los Angeles are urban sprawls,
with massive freeways that force residents td
money on cars and gas.
 The Challenges of Global Cities

• Urban areas consume most of the world’s energy.

Cities only cover 2% of the world’s landmass, but
they consume 78% of global energy. Therefore, if
carbon emissions must be out to prevent global
warming, this massive energy consumption in
cities must be curbed.
 The Global City
and The Poor
We have consistently
noted that economic
globalization has
paved the way for
massive inequality.
This phenomenon is
thus very
pronounced in cities.
● As the City attracts more capital and richer, residents
are forced to relocate to far away but cheaper areas.
This phenomenon of driving out the poor in favor of
newer, wealthier residents is called
GENTRIFICATION.
Once living in the public urban housing, they were
forced to move farther away from city centers that offer
more jobs, more government services, and better
transfortation due to gentrification.
In France, poor Muslim migrants are forced out of
Paris and have clustered around ethnic enclaves known
as banlieue.
❖In most of the world’s global cities, the middle class is also thinning out.
❖Globalization creates high income jobs that are concentrated in global
cities.
❖These high earners, in turn, generate demand for an unskilled labor
force that will attend to their increasing needs.
❖Meanwhile, many middle-income jobs in manufacturing and business
process outsourcing are moving to other countries.
❖This hallowing out of the class in global cities has heightened the
inequality within them.
❖A large global city may thus be a paradise to some, but a suffering for
others.
Global cities as noted in this lesson, are sites of mediums of
globalization. They are, therefore, material representations
of the phenomenon. Through them, we see the best of
globalization: they are places that create exciting fusions of
culture and ideas. They are also places that generates
tremendous wealth. However, they remain sites of
inequality where global servants serve global entrepreneurs.
The question of how globalization can be made more just is
partly a question of how people make their cities more just.