European Conference on Complex Systems Paris, 14-18 November 2005

Civilizations as dynamic
networks
Cities, hinterlands,
populations, industries,
trade and conflict
Douglas R. White
2005 All rights reserved
50 slides - also viewable on drw conference
paper website version 1.3 of 11/12/2005

acknowledgements

Thanks to the International Program of the Santa Fe Institute for support of the
work on urban scaling with Nataa Kejar and Constantino Tsallis, and thanks to
the ISCOM project (Information Society as a Complex System) principal
investigators David Lane, Geoff West, Sander van der Leeuw and Denise
Pumain for ISCOM support of collaboration with Peter Spufford at Cambridge, and
for research assistance support from Joseph Wehbe. Also thanks to David
Krakauer and Luis Bettencourt at SFI in suggesting how our multilayered
models of rise and fall of city networks could be guided by sufficient statistics
modeling principles and to Lane and van der Leeuw for suggestions on the
slides. This study is complemented by others within the ISCOM project concerned
with urban scaling and innovation and draws several slides from those projects.
Thanks to Peter Spufford for his generous support in providing systematic
empirical data on intercity networks and industries in the medieval period to
complement the data in his book, Dean Anuska Ferligoj, School of Social
Sciences, University of Ljubljana, for five weeks of support for work carried out
with Kejar in Ljubljana in summer, 2005, Cline Rozenblat (ISCOM project) for
providing the historical urban size data, and Camille Roth (Polytechnic, Paris) for
collaborations on representing evolutions of multiple industries across city netwks.
A jointly authored on this project is in draft with Spufford and possibly others.

Outline re: civilizations as dynamic networks

some main approaches and areas of findings

1 Urban scaling: distributional scaling and historical transitions
City functions (Geoff West , Luis Bettencourt, Jos Lobo 2005)
City growth and inequality parameters: From Zipf's rank size laws to power laws to a
stronger scaling theory of q-exponentials
Periodizing: Historical q-periods and their correlates
Commercial vs. Financial capital and organization
Market equilibrium vs. Structural Inflation

2 Rise and fall of intercity networks (e.g., trade and conflict)

Key concept: structural cohesion and its effects, such as market zones and price
equilibrium vs. inflation in cohesive cores versus peripheries (White and Harary
2002 SocMeth, Moody and White 2003 ASR)
Similarly, effects of network betweenness versus flow centrality on commercial vs.
financial capital and institutional organization

3 Interactive dynamics: world population, cities and hinterlands, polities

economic growth versus sociopolitical conflict
organizational change at macro level and micro level.

General approach: interactive multi-nets, networks among and between

different types of entities in time series with changing links and attributes

Co-evolution time-series of Cities and City Networks

City attributes and

distributions

begin Dynamics from

Urban Hierarchy-Industries,
_______Commerce,
Finance

Structural Cohesion

Routes, Capacities

Unit Formation (e.g. polities)

Velocities and Magnitudes

of trade

City Sizes Hierarchy

Demography/Resources

Hinterland Productivity

Conflicts

periodize

STATES
from factions & coalitions
to sovereignty - emergent
Spatiopolitical units

City Networks

Interference and
attempts at regulation
Sources of boundary
conflicts

Organizational transformation
of nodes

MARKETS
from structurally cohesive
k-components - emergent
Network units (overlap) 4

Urban Scaling: Functions

Geoff West, Luis Bettencourt, Jos Lobo. 2005 (Pace of City Life):
Innovation-Dependent (Superlinear), Linear, and Scale-Efficient (Sublinear) Power Laws

Superlinear ~ 1.67

Linear ~ 1

Sublinear ~ .85

ISCOM working paper

Urban Scaling: City Sizes

the next few slides compare the scale K and coefficients of the power-law
y(x) K x- (and Pareto = +1) with the q-exponential parameters for q
slope and scale in y(x) ~ [1 + (1q) x/)]1/(1q), fitted to entire size curves

(White, Kejar, Tsallis, and Rozenblat 2005 working paper)

=1
=2
Not a good fit to
overall city size
distributions
Vertical axis y =
Power laws and Zipfs law might
cumulative number
fit upper bin frequencies for city
sizes but not the whole curve
of cities at this log
bin or higher

inset: y = cumulative
number of people
in these cities

Dashed line = portion of distribution that is "power-law

(but is exaggerated in the upper bins)

Horizontal axis x = binned (logs of city size)

Example: 1950 United Nations data for world cities

+ + (1q) x/)]1/(1q), as function of q, , binned size x

At time
t, populationscaling
y(x) ~
y(0)
Q-exponential
.99[1
fit to 18 post-1800 and 22 pre-1800 distributions

power law coef. = 1/(q-1) equals 2 for q = 1.5,

thus more equality at the asymptote

for 2005:

=1
=2
q = 1.5

In this segment of the data

series the upper bin slope is
going from q ~ 2 in 1800
(inegalitarian, = 1) to q ~
1.5 (egalitarian) in 2000.
If these distributions were
actual
power
laws, they
fitted
q-exponential
should
straight line
fits in
distributions,
q, .
this log-log graph.

1950

% Urban in Europe
more inequality
at the asymptote:

(for 1800)

= 0.24
= 1.24
q = 1.8

=1
=2
q = 1.5
City-size bins

The entire city-size distributions for these 18 time periods are

fitted here by q and ( not just the Zipfian upper size bins)
Dotted lines here are city numbers for each size bin.

The x axis has the city sizebins, e.g., 20.0 = 200,000

people or more.
The dotted lines show
number of cities in multiples
of two: 2,4,8,16,32,etc.
Units of 10K

Log cumulative populations in cities at least this bin size

Stylized q-exponentials
~2
~ 1 (high)
q ~ 1.5 (low) more
egalitarian thin tail :
like the standard
Zipfian
<2
< 1 (low)
q ~ 2 (high)
Inegalitarian fat tail:
possibly heterarchical
with the Adamic effect
of average local
Realistic critical
nghbhood
feature different
heterogeneity wrt hubs
than power laws:
city size truncation
(L Adamic et al 2003)
Log city bin size

(note the connection here to networks: city links to other nearby cities)

Stylized contrasts and

historical examples in
unlogged graphs:
~ 1, high
e.g., year 2005

egalitarian thin tail;

few hubs (bigger towns) in
average neighborhoods

< 1, low
e.g., year 1800

inegalitarian fat tail; e.g.,

industrial revolution pushes out
to fatten smaller towns; hubs in
average neighborhoods

=2 (=1) long thin tail; greater size equality

1 ( 0)

thicker tail; greater

size inequality

430 BCE to 1750

The q-slopes for all

periods are well
bounded from 1
(inequality, i.e., fat
tails) to =2 (i.e., thin
tails, equality)
Tails truncate because
the city numbers are
discrete (dotted line =
1 city), with limits
above which there are
no larger cities.
Truncation at a finite
limit allows a powerlaw distribution to
flatten as (=-1)0.
This is more realistic
than a scale-free
model.
10

World city sizes scaled in 28 reliable-estimate periods, fitted slope q & scale (kappa)

Hi

Kappa detrended

heterarchy
MoreHi inequality
q of city sizes
Hi

Lo

Lo

Lo

Scale of city sizes, detrended

At time t, population y(x) y(0) [1 + (1q) x/)]1/(1q), as function of q, , binned size x

Detrending method:
increasing and headed
to singularity post-2000
11
2000 1750 1500 1250 1000 750 500 250

0 -250

World city sizes scaled in 28 periods, fitted slope q, scale (kappa)

Hi

Lo

Hi

Lo

Hi

Lo

At time t, population y(x) y(0) [1 + (1q) x/)]1/(1q), as function of q, , binned size x

Time is reversed in the two graphs

12
2000 1750 1500 1250 1000 750 500 250

0 -250

Contiguous time periods (verified by runs test), discrete (1-7) periods

World cities
phase
diagram

>1950 Mass
urbanization

egalitarian hierarchy

inegalitarian hierarchy

13

Co-evolution of Cities and City Networks

City attributes and

distributions

Dynamics from

City Networks

Pop. Size Hierarchy

Structural Cohesion

Routes, Capacities, Markets

Urban Industries plus

Unit Formation (e.g. polities)

Velocities and Magnitudes

of trade

Commerce, Finance
Hinterland Productivity

Demography/Resources
Conflicts

Organizational transformation
of nodes, periods;
commercial, financial, religious

periodize

for the Circum-Mediterranean all major industries and their

distributions across cities in the trading city networks are also coded in
generational (25 year) intervals, and the capacities of transport routes
are similarly coded in 25 year intervals. All-Eurasia coding incomplete.

14

q-dependent variables

historical q-correlates? (Circum-Mediterranean)

Alternation in inflationary market trends?
Evaluated with 13 datasets (near-equilibrium vs. inflation
periods from Spufford 1982, Fischer 1996)
Alternation of trade hegemony with new q-periods?
Evaluated with dates of q-alternations and other periods
(commercial vs. financial centers)
Alternation of periods of organization forms?
Evaluated with Arrighi data, 1994, 5 periods, 1100-1990
(commercial vs. financial capital)
15

Summary of historical correlates of hierarchy variable q

Inegalitarian q (high)

Egalitarian q (low)

below trend line

above trend line

Periods of Low Inflation

Inflation?

Periods of High Inflation

(#s are q - periods)

High

2-3

-1320

1350-1520

Low

High

3-4

1500-1650

1650-1780

Low

High

4-5

1750-1810

1830-1910

Low

High

5-6

1925-2005

Periods: Commercial
Capital

Hegemony
of European

(1340-85)

Financial Capital
:Periods

hubs
c.1000

Constantinople

Venice

c.1100-1297

1298-1380

Genoa

Holland

1610-1730

1797-1917

Britain

U.S.A.

1950-?

16

Euro-Hegemon
examples
(Arrighi 1994)
Commercial
Financial
(hegemonic cities
in historic order)
Amsterdam

Constantinople
Venice
Genoa
Amsterdam
London
New York
17

Betweenness centrality in the trade network predicts accumulation of mercantile wealth

and emergence of commercial hegemons. e.g., in the 13th century, Genoa has greatest
betweeness, greatest wealth, as predicted. Later developments in the north shift the network
betweeness center to England.
Episodically,
in 1298,
Genoa
defeated the
Venetians at
sea.
Repeating
the pattern,
England later
defeats the
Dutch at sea

Size of nodes adjusted

to indicate differences
in betweenness
centrality of trading
cities in the banking
network

Betweenness Centralities in the banking network

18
Given its 13th C betweenness centrality, Genoa generated the most wealth

Flow centrality (how much total network flow is reduced with removal of a node) predicts
the potential for profit-making on trade flows, emergence of financial centers, and
(reflecting flow velocities, as Spufford argues) organizational transformations in different
cities. Here, Bruges is a predicted profit center, prior to succession by Amsterdam.

This type of
centrality is
conceptually very
different. It maps
out very differently
than strategic
betweenness
centers like
Genoa, which are
relatively low in
flow centrality.

19

Bipartite network cohesion in Hanse saintly brotherhood trade organization

Medieval Hanse trading towns had religious brotherhoods under a Patron Saint
for a distant church of the same Saint (kaufmannskirch), which hosted the
traders and protected their goods. The more distant the trading locations, into
foreign lands, the more frequent the construction of matching
kaufmannskirchen.
Core towns
Northeast

Southwest

Linking
kaufmannskirchen
(by Saint name)

Distant towns

Additional linking
kaufmannskirchen

Commercial

Inflation Lo/hi
Financial capital

time-series data coded by 25 year periods, hegemonic economic organization:

C = Commercial capital (e.g., colonizing or diaspora traders)
F = Financial capital (e.g., corporate traders)
supported propositions:
initial C, F => L (low inflation), little or no time lag
initial C => I (inegalitarian city hierarchy)
initial F => E (egalitarian city hierarchy)
L gives way to h (high inflation) within E(galitarian) and I(negalitarian)

21

Type of hegemony and inflation as q-correlated temporal variables

Commercial

Inflation Lo/hi
Financial capital

time-series data coded by 25 year periods, hegemonic economic organization:

C = Commercial capital (e.g., colonizing or diaspora traders)
F = Financial capital (e.g., corporate traders)
supported propositions:
initial C, F => L (low inflation), little or no time lag
initial C => I (inegalitarian city hierarchy)
initial F => E (egalitarian city hierarchy)
L gives way to h (high inflation) within E, I

22

Transaction costs, hegemony and inflation as q-correlated temporal variables

Commercial

Inflation Lo/hi
Financial capital

Dominant Routes

Maritime
(low cost)

Conflict on Land Sea

trade routes safer than
land, 1318-1453/4+

versus
Land
routes
trade
(pop.
growth)

(Spufford:407)

Landed Trade
Secure

Peace of
Westphalia Struggle
for
Sea
Empire: Global
Maritime
routes Sea
Battles Economy
to 1815 Industrial Rev.
safe
French Sov.

from 1760

Political
Landed Armies safe
Revolutions to
1814
land routes 15001650 Maritime
Conflicts (Jan
Glete)
Baltic conflicts: connection to Novgorod and Russia (lost)

Trade net
(low cost)
versus
(high cost)

Swedish hegemony
European access

23

From
Dominant Routes to a Land Routes variable
Recode previous slide
predict
landed inter-national conflict

Hegemony-type and inflation as q-correlated temporal variables

Commercial

Heterarchy

Inflation Lo/hi
Hierarchy

Financial capital

Land Routes

Land
routes
UNSAFE
versus
Land
routes
SAFE

Conflict on Land Sea

trade routes safer than
land, 1318-1453/4+
(Spufford:407)

French Sov.

from 1760

Landed Armies Land

Routes safer than sea
1500-1650 Maritime
Conflicts (Jan Glete)

Political
Revolutions to
1814

Landed Trade
Secure
Sea unsafe
star bank
routes

Interactive Dynamics

Commercial capital competition

landed inter-national conflict,
with generational time lag

Peace of
Westphalia Struggle
for
Sea
Empire: Global
Maritime
routes Sea
Battles Economy
to 1815 Industrial Rev.
safe

Baltic conflicts: connection to Novgorod and Russia (lost)

Hierarchy (I) city distributions

landed civil conflict, with
multiple generation time lag

Swedish hegemony
European access

Landed international
conflict is
protracted
(versus)
Landed
international
peace (incl.
WW I or II
followed by
peace)

24

Commercial and financial centers as q-correlated temporal variables

Sea unsafe
cohesive bank routes

Sea unsafe

star bank routes

star bank routes

cohesive bank routes

Underwarer
star bank
cohesive bank routes
routes

Commercial

Inflation Lo/hi

Domestic

Fustians (innov.: cotton-linen)

Imported cotton, manuf.

woven cotton

Constantinople

Venice

Industrial center
Commerce center
Commercial Finance =Blue

Champaign Fairs

Financial capital
Industry

(Blue = Commercial Finance

Red = Medici Bank & profits ;
controlled by Florentines)
Red = Financial profit center

Genoa

Florence
Arras

Bruges

Shift of financial center due to civil

war of 1480

Antwerp
Amsterdam

Add: religious centered trade

London

25

Co-evolution of Cities and City Networks

City attributes and

distributions

Dynamics from

City Networks

Pop. Size Hierarchy

Structural Cohesion

Routes, Capacities

Urban Industries plus

Unit Formation (e.g. polities)

Velocities and Magnitudes

of trade

Commerce, Finance
Hinterland Productivity

Demography/Resources
Conflicts

Organizational transformation
of nodes

26

For example, among medieval merchants and merchant cities of the 13th century,
cohesive trade zones (gold nodes) and their potential for market pricing supported the
creation of wealth, with states benefiting by marketplace taxation and loans.
Lbeck

(early slide, merely

illustrative, not to scale,
network incomplete)

banking network
cohesion

The Hanse League port of Lbeck at its peak had about 1/6th the trade of Genoa, 1/5th that of
Venice; its network had a well documented colonial and religious-brotherhood trade organization.

28

the banking network, main routes only (again, geographically).

Control networks often rely
on unambiguous centralized
spines but their operation
relies on feedback in
cohesive networks.
banking network
hierarchy

the spine of the exchange system

is tree-like and thus centralized.
It is land based. Linking the four
parts was Alessandria, a small
stronghold fortification built in
1164-1167 by the Lombard
League and named for Pope
Alexander III. At first a free
commune, the city passed in
1348 to the duchy of Milan.
Note again the closeness of
Genoa to the center, and the
exclusion of Venice.
29

With expanded coding and further road identification for the medieval network, 2nd(gold) and 3rd-order cohesiveness (red nodes) reveals multiple cohesive zones such
as those of Western Europe or the Russian plains. Again, this cohesion supported the
creation of wealth among merchants and merchant cities, with states benefiting by
taxation and loans.

Red 3-components

Middle East and its

3-component also
In Northern Europe the main Hanse League port of Lubeck had about 1/6th the trade of Genoa, 1/5th that of
Venice.
30

RISE AND FALL

Silk, Jade and Porcelain
from China
Spice trade from India a
nd SE Asia
Gold and Salt from Afric
a

The lead-up to the 13th C

world-system and its economy
was a period of population
expansion and then crisis as
environmental carrying
capacities were reached.

In the 14th C, economic depression

set in, inflation abated and
population dropped, with famines
beginning well before the Black
Death. After closure of the Golden
Horde/Mongol Corridor (1360s),
the EurAsian network crashed.

To illustrate the effects of structural cohesion in the trade route network on the
development of market pricing versus structural inflation, we could start with the
AfroEurasian world-system at the end of the pre-classical period in 500 BCE -

What came before the medieval networks rise and fall?

31

These trade routes

mostly form a tree, with
a narrow structurally
cohesive trading zone
(with market potential)
from India to Gibraltar

Trade networks before

500 BCE were smaller,
even more tree-like, and
lacking cohesion

32

Cohesive extension of trade routes leads to a host of other developments

(figures courtesy of Andrew Sherratt, ArchAtlas)

33

Multiconnected regions => structural cohesion variables

During classical
antiquity trade
routes become
much more
structurally
cohesive from
China to France

34

Multiconnected regions => structural cohesion variables

35

Multiconnected regions => structural cohesion variables

36

Multiconnected regions => structural cohesion variables

Some
changes in
the medieval
network from
1000 CE

37

Multiconnected regions => structural cohesion variables

to 1500 CE

(note changes
in biconnected
zones of
structural
cohesion)
Project mapping is
proceeding for
cities and trade
networks for all of
AfroEurasia and
urban industries
for Europe in 25year intervals,
1150-1500
(our technology for cities / zones / trade networks / distributions of multiple industries across
cities for each time period includes dynamic GIS overlays, flyover and zoomable web
images)

38

Co-evolution of Cities and City Networks

City attributes and

distributions

Dynamics from

City Networks

Pop. Size Hierarchy

Structural Cohesion

Routes, Capacities

Urban Industries plus

Unit Formation (e.g. polities)

Velocities and Magnitudes

of trade

Commerce, Finance
Hinterland Productivity

Demography/Resources
Conflicts

Organizational transformation
of nodes

Scarcity;
Periods of: Inflation;
Competition;
Sociopolitical
violence;

39

Data sources and dynamic interaction analyses

Peter Spufford - in Power & Profit (2002)

shows how rises in the velocity of trade in intercity networks
causes transformations in organizations.
Peter Turchin - in Structure & Dynamics (2005)
demonstrates dynamic interactions between governance,
conflicts, unraveling, on the one hand, and population
oscillations on the other (structural demographic theory)

40

(Turchin 2005)

Chinese phase diagram

41

English sociopolitical violence cycles dont directly correlate but lag population
cycles. Detrended English population cycles, 1100-1900, occur every 300-200 years.
(Turchin 2005)

Source:
Turchin

42

Turchin tests statistically the interactive prediction versus the inertial prediction for
England, Han China (200 BCE -300 CE), Tang China (600 CE - 1000)
(Turchin 2005)

43

Geoff West, Luis Bettencourt, Jos Lobo. 2005 (Pace of City Life):
Revisiting the Innovation-Dependent Superlinear Case

Unsustainable
superlinear growth

superlinear growth
crisis

superlinear growth
crisis

superlinear growth
crisis

Resetting growth
through costly
innovation

Resetting growth
through costly
innovation

Resetting growth
through costly
innovation

44

Cities and hinterlands context variables

World population 'response' to power-law city growth

1250

Kremer data; Fitted Coefficients of Equation 1, Nt = CN /

(t t)
e 0
k

CN

Up to (following period)

Period
Length

-5000 or earlier

1.19

560000000

Classical Antiquity

n.a.

n.a.

-200 (q turns hi?)

0.26

36000

Medieval Renaissance

c.7000

3.8

1250 (q turns hi)

0.175

19000

Industrial Revolution

c.1450

3.2

1750-1860 (ditto)

0.15

1700

Consumer Economy

c.610

2.8

c.100?

2.0

Start Year

Post-1962 (ditto)

Log of Length
.
(linearly decreasing)

45

q-dependent variables

power-law population growth is unsustainable,

generates decreasing lengths of oscillations, also
general inflection points (e.g., flattening, crisis)
World population growth rate is slower with q-flat city
growth, but also tends to diminish at the end of each
type of q-period. Possibly a failure of innovation rate
because leading cities depend on innovation.

46

Geoff West, Luis Bettencourt, Jos Lobo. 2005 (Pace of City Life):
Revisiting the Innovation Dependent Superlinear Case

World pop.
Downturn

World
urbanization
inflections
47
(I have added the correlations of world and NYC population shifts)

Stylized facts:

Economic macro variables

1. Gross World Economic Product

grows not in proportion to 1/(time
to singularity), as does population,
but 1/ /(time to singularity)2

(David Hackett Fischer 1996)

2. Inflation, however, is more

sensitive to global and local
fluctuations of population
above and below its
superlinear trend-line, which
also correlate with q-periods.

Renaissance
Equilibrium
(begins with
economic
depression)

(Turchin 2005)
1900

48

Co-evolution of Cities and City Networks

City attributes and

distributions

Dynamics from

City Networks

Pop. Size Hierarchy

Structural Cohesion

Routes, Capacities

Urban Industries plus

Unit Formation (e.g. polities)

Velocities and Magnitudes

of trade

Commerce, Finance
Hinterland Productivity

Demography/Resources
Conflicts

Organizational transformation
of nodes

49

The population and sociopolitical crisis dynamic that drove inflation in the 12th-15th
centuries also drove monetization and trade in luxury goods. Inflation of land value created
migration of impoverished peasants ejected from the land, demands of money rents for
parts of rural estates, and substitution of salaries for payments in land to retainers.
(Relative to Carrying Capacity)
Prices
Real wages
(low)

Inflation

In kind payment of serfs,

retainers salaried laborers

Demand for
prestige goods

Poverty forces more

meltdown of silver

Demand for
money rents

Peasants
to cities

Elites to cities

Conspicuous
consumption

Demand for
silver mining

Coinage

Monetization
(Velocity of Money in Exchange)

Effects of Inflation of Land

Thresholds
(Variables affecting transition)
Reorganization
(to handle higher velocities)

on Monetization
(Spufford 2002)

e.g., Division of labor, new techniques, road building, bridge building, new transport
Merchants/agents
Governments/agents
Churches/agents
Elites/agents

50

References
Adamic, Lada, et al. 2003. Local search in unstructured networks. In, Bornholdt and Schuster, eds.,
Handbook of Graphs and Networks. Wiley-VCH.

Arrighi, Giovanni. 1994. The Long Twentieth Century. London: Verso.

Fischer, David Hackett. 1996. The Great Wave: Price Revolutions and the Rhythm of History.
Oxford University Press
Sherratt, Andrew. (visited) 2005. ArchAtlas. http://www.arch.ox.ac.uk/ArchAtlas/
Spufford, Peter. 2002. Power and Profit: The Merchant in Medieval Europe. Cambridge U Press.
Tsallis, Constantino. 1988. Possible generalization of Boltzmann-Gibbs statistics, J.Stat.Phys. 52,
479.
Turchin, Peter. 2005. Dynamical Feedbacks between Population Growth and Sociopolitical Instability
in Agrarian States. Structure and Dynamics 1(1):Art2. http://repositories.cdlib.org/imbs/socdyn/sdeas/
West, Geoff, Luis Bettencourt, Jos Lobo. 2005. The Pace of City Life: Growth, Innovation and Scale.
Ms. Santa Fe Institute, Project ISCOM.
Douglas R. White, Natasa Kejzar, Constantino Tsallis, Doyne Farmer, and Scott White. 2005. A
generative model for feedback networks. Physica A forthcoming. http://arxiv.org/abs/condmat/0508028
White, Douglas R., Natasa Keyzar, Constantino Tsallis and Celine Rozenblat. 2005. Ms. Generative
Historical Model of City Size Hierarchies: 430 BCE 2005. Ms. Santa Fe Institute.
White, Douglas R., and Peter Spufford. (Book Ms.) 2005. Medieval to Modern: Civilizations as
Dynamic Networks. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

51

Co-evolution of Cities and City Networks

City attributes and

distributions

Dynamics from

City Networks

Pop. Size Hierarchy

Structural Cohesion

Routes, Capacities

Urban Industries plus

Unit Formation (e.g. polities)

Velocities and Magnitudes

of trade

Commerce, Finance
Hinterland Productivity

STATES
from factions & coalitions
to sovereignty - emergent
Spatiopolitical units

Demography/Resources
Conflicts

Interference and
attempts at regulation
Sources of boundary
conflicts

Organizational transformation
of nodes

MARKETS
from structurally cohesive
k-components - emergent
52
Network units (overlap)

53

Cumulative population is used because by taking only the populations in

each size bin in different growth periods differential city growth generates the
dogs-eaten-by-snake phenomena:
Time1

Time2

Time3

Time4

Time5

Actual 1965 data on distribution at one time smoothed cumulative distributions

innovative
bulges in city
sizes move
thru time
A cumulative distribution has with more
population in the lower bins requires
curve fitting such as y ~ log (x) with lower
bins weighted proportional to population.
The upper bins show bias toward longer
tails compared to semi-log but less than a
power-law tendency, as in these data.

Power-law: poor fit

Semilog y ~ log(x): poor fit

Fitting here uses bins
with largest numbers

54

Semilog y ~ log(x) scaling r2~.99 fits

Which is an integral of Zifp's law, approximately a log if the exponents are exactly 1)
Total number of people in cities at or above the city size bin

1950 and
earlier

1950 to 2005

city size bins, logged

Changes in slope over time are not directly
comparable over historical periods: they tend to
flatten further back in time but irregularly.
Because the curves bend at the tails, but
the Zipf parameter varies considerably
around ~ 1, these data are be nicely
modeled by q-exponentials with q and
size parameters that are more
comparable over time.

1800 and earlier

55
unlogged

1/(1q)
+
At time t, population y(x) y(0)
[1 + (1q) x/)]
, as
function
Q-exponential
scaling
~ .99
fit of q, , binned size x

power law coef. = 1/(q-1) => (= 2 for q = 1.5)

thus more equality at the asymptote

(for 2005)

=1
=2
q = 1.5

q =1.81
q =1.61
q =1.70
q =1.57
q =1.50
q =2.01
q =2.08
q =2.01
q =1.84
q =2.1
q =1.9
more inequality
at the asymptote:

(for 1800)

1950

= 0.24
= 1.24
q = 1.8

=1
=2
q = 1.5

In this segment of the data

series the upper bin slope is
going from q ~ 2 in 1800
(inegalitarian, = 1) to q ~
1.5 (egalitarian) in 2000.
If these distributions were
actual power laws, they
would
beq-exponential
best-fitted by a
fitted
straight
line in this
distributions,
q, log-log
.
graph.
Urbanhas
in Europe
The x% axis
the city sizebins, e.g., 20.0 = 200,000
people or more.

The dotted lines show

number of cities in multiples
of two: 4, 8,16,32,etc.

City-size bins

The entire city-size distributions for these 18 time periods are

fitted by q and , not just the upper size bins
Dotted lines here are city numbers for each size bin.

Units of 10K 56