The Rise of the Network Society
Castells talk about different aspects of society and how it affects time, space, and place.
Information technologies have changed the world we lived in and have both created and been affected by globalization. In the world today, there are a number of regional centers (such as Hong Kong, Zurich, Moscow, etc) that are rapidly joining the international market and expanding the global economy. In a study done by Cappelin on the European Union, he concluded that “the relative importance of city-region relationships seems to decrease with respect to the importance of the relationships which interlink various cities of different regions and countries…”(411) Thus, Castells believes that the global society cannot be reduced to hierarchical organizations. He believes that globalization stimulates regionalization. The greater the city-regions and networks become, the more interlinks the regions and localities appear to be. Castells believes that a hierarchical network is needed to keep stability, but that it also must be flexible to evolve with today’s increasing demands. The global city must not be a place, but a process. “A process by which centers of production and consumption of advances services are connected in a global network, while simultaneously downplaying the linkages with their hinterlands on the basis of information flows.” (417) See Figure 6.3 on page 420 for the relationships between the characteristics of information technology manufacturing and the industry’s spatial pattern. Castells emphasizes “new industrial space does not represent the demise of old, established metropolitan areas” (424). Furthermore, the rise of technology does not mean the end of cities, most definitely the opposite. Despite claims that technology is driving decentralization, Castells argues that this trend is also cyclical. The information age is undoubtedly ushering new urban form, melding different metropolises together. As “space is an expression of society”(440), the spatial articulation of major networks takes place in our society through conversations between various organizations and is made possible through the use of technological devices. Hence, the transformation of architectural and urban spaces is a representation of the current demands of society and how we evolve those networks that participate within it.
Monday, September 17, 2007
Global City-Regions
Global City Regions
Agnew, Scott, Sojato , and Storper try to illustrate the current issues global city-regions are facing. Due to globalization, “the processes of worldwide economic integration and accelerated urban growth make traditional planning and policy strategies in these regions increasingly problematical…”(1).
The problems they hope to address were:
1. Why are the global city-regions growing rapidly precisely at a moment in history when some analysts are claiming that the end of geography is in sight?
2. How have the forms of economic and social organization in city-regions responded to globalization, and what new problems have been created as a consequence?
3. What main governance tasks do global city-regions face as they seek to preserve and enhance their wealth and well-being?
4. Is it possible for the less economically advanced parts of the world to harness the potential benefits of global city-region development to their own advantage and what are the main drawback of such development for them?
5. How can we define the public interest in culturally heterogeneous global city regions? How are the traditional notions of democracy and citizenship being challenged by the emergence of global city-regions and in what ways can they be made more effective?
The writers begin by describing how during the post-world war period the strongest capitalist economies had strong centralized governments that ensured manageable political, economic, and urban frameworks. Although international trade was a part of a state’s affairs during the post-war era, there sector of political affairs rarely was involved or affected the domestic economic policies.
However, with globalization today governments are presented with new issues of organization. States have created hierarchies of political and social agents to help deal with these problems. These include institutional networks like the IMF, multination blocs such as the EU, etc. Region-based political and economic organizations are a strategic response to the heightened competition between nations as a result of globalization, and clustering of these needs improves efficiency: greater routinization of production, and in the manufacturing of such goods. Thus, urban concentration is affected by productivity in two ways: first, “concentration secures overall efficiency of the economic system and secondly”, it “intensifies creativity, learning, and innovation both by increased flexibility of producers and knowledge that occur with these transactional links”(17).
Social stratification is an example of the changes in social geography with these global city-regions in that these regions are not only experiencing migration but also demographical changes. Another affect of globalization is the economic restructuralization of social geography: the gap between the rich and poor is widening.
The cities are extending outward, becoming more diverse, but the urban societies are not necessarily giving equal opportunities.
Developing Global City-Regions are also experiencing increased economic activity due to globalization of these city-regions. A trend the authors take note of is the situation where a “small number of cities in these countries comes to account for a high proportion of the national population”(24). Yet, the difference with these developing countries is that it becomes difficult to manage the enormous influx of population. The huge economic disparities create a situation where “it becomes impossible to finance needed improvements in infrastructure and services.”(24)
The governments of these third-world nations have made attempts to deal with this problem with privatization yet the infrastructures are not yet suited to sustain privatization of all networks. Consequently, the authors end noting that ideological and political challenges must be altered for all nation states to evolve to the growing issues of worldwide globalization in political and the international market.
Agnew, Scott, Sojato , and Storper try to illustrate the current issues global city-regions are facing. Due to globalization, “the processes of worldwide economic integration and accelerated urban growth make traditional planning and policy strategies in these regions increasingly problematical…”(1).
The problems they hope to address were:
1. Why are the global city-regions growing rapidly precisely at a moment in history when some analysts are claiming that the end of geography is in sight?
2. How have the forms of economic and social organization in city-regions responded to globalization, and what new problems have been created as a consequence?
3. What main governance tasks do global city-regions face as they seek to preserve and enhance their wealth and well-being?
4. Is it possible for the less economically advanced parts of the world to harness the potential benefits of global city-region development to their own advantage and what are the main drawback of such development for them?
5. How can we define the public interest in culturally heterogeneous global city regions? How are the traditional notions of democracy and citizenship being challenged by the emergence of global city-regions and in what ways can they be made more effective?
The writers begin by describing how during the post-world war period the strongest capitalist economies had strong centralized governments that ensured manageable political, economic, and urban frameworks. Although international trade was a part of a state’s affairs during the post-war era, there sector of political affairs rarely was involved or affected the domestic economic policies.
However, with globalization today governments are presented with new issues of organization. States have created hierarchies of political and social agents to help deal with these problems. These include institutional networks like the IMF, multination blocs such as the EU, etc. Region-based political and economic organizations are a strategic response to the heightened competition between nations as a result of globalization, and clustering of these needs improves efficiency: greater routinization of production, and in the manufacturing of such goods. Thus, urban concentration is affected by productivity in two ways: first, “concentration secures overall efficiency of the economic system and secondly”, it “intensifies creativity, learning, and innovation both by increased flexibility of producers and knowledge that occur with these transactional links”(17).
Social stratification is an example of the changes in social geography with these global city-regions in that these regions are not only experiencing migration but also demographical changes. Another affect of globalization is the economic restructuralization of social geography: the gap between the rich and poor is widening.
The cities are extending outward, becoming more diverse, but the urban societies are not necessarily giving equal opportunities.
Developing Global City-Regions are also experiencing increased economic activity due to globalization of these city-regions. A trend the authors take note of is the situation where a “small number of cities in these countries comes to account for a high proportion of the national population”(24). Yet, the difference with these developing countries is that it becomes difficult to manage the enormous influx of population. The huge economic disparities create a situation where “it becomes impossible to finance needed improvements in infrastructure and services.”(24)
The governments of these third-world nations have made attempts to deal with this problem with privatization yet the infrastructures are not yet suited to sustain privatization of all networks. Consequently, the authors end noting that ideological and political challenges must be altered for all nation states to evolve to the growing issues of worldwide globalization in political and the international market.
Saskia Sassen--Cities in a World Economy
Sassen starts off by listing off questions that should be addressed in light of globalization: what jobs are created by globalization and high capital mobility? Is there a new economic configuration? What is it?A new strategic role for cities? She believes that place still matters and sets out to prove why.
Globalization, she argues, creates jobs. Every time businesses relocate they create a new demand for managerial positions and professional jobs as much as it creates low wage unskilled jobs. She discusses the enormous role speculation plays in globalization. This argument seems to be working against the importance of place in my mind.
The Urban Impact of Globalization:
I'll finish this later. I just got the overwhelming urge to take a nap.
Globalization, she argues, creates jobs. Every time businesses relocate they create a new demand for managerial positions and professional jobs as much as it creates low wage unskilled jobs. She discusses the enormous role speculation plays in globalization. This argument seems to be working against the importance of place in my mind.
The Urban Impact of Globalization:
I'll finish this later. I just got the overwhelming urge to take a nap.
Sunday, September 16, 2007
Summary of Central Place Theory Reading
Dent and Heck
Central Place Theory (CPT)is a method to understanding the "role of a city as a service center." Walter Christaller created a theory relating the city to its hinterlands. He believed it was more than a result of physical characteristics--that it was more about the exchange of ideas and commodities and exchange of goods (I guess that makes him sort of Jacobs focussed, rather than Childes). To develop the theory, Christaller made two assumptions: all land is flat and equal in value and the actors are economically rational. What he concluded was that there was an actual system to size and spacing of places (a hierarchical model of hamlet, village, town, city and regional capital). He also made a geometrical model of hexagons demonstrating how far a market stretched before the need for a new market.
The rigidity of Christaller's model got him into trouble. Losche came along and saved the day. Losche allowed one central place to have all the central goods and services present in the economic system. He assumed that many markets operated simultaneously. He then tried to find the least number of centers necessary. He also incorporated transportation into his formula although it is vague how (pg 146).
There is a nice model on pg 147 of how they compare.
Preference Structure
The preference structure models have more to do with the psychology of the customer and consumer behavior. Different methods of analysis were used to determine trends and the trends were placed spatially. For instance it was concluded that both distance and town size are relevant stimuli for a consumer shopping behavior. People are willing to bypass a small town to go to a town with more options but is farther away. This obviously affects the regional development of areas as well and should be taken into account as transportation costs continue to decrease.
Christaller also gets into trouble without being able to adjust to a periodic market (an inconsistent market) and wholesaling. Basically--central place is really rigid making it more of a special case than the general growth pattern.
CPT is applicable to planning new settlements. "in the end, the utility of a theory is demonstrated not in its mathematical elegance of esoteric theorems, but in its relevance in resolving real world problems."
Terms:
threshold: amount of purchasing power required to support a person engaged in a tertiary business activity
range of a good: the market area for the good (the distance people travel to purchase a good)
low-order goods are goods that everyone needs and are sold rather cheaply and high order goods are goods like jewelery that involve larger expenditures per trip in both time and money.
centrality:
size and spacing: 5 tiered hierarchical system (hamlet, village, town, city, regional capital)
functional hierarchy
Central Place Theory (CPT)is a method to understanding the "role of a city as a service center." Walter Christaller created a theory relating the city to its hinterlands. He believed it was more than a result of physical characteristics--that it was more about the exchange of ideas and commodities and exchange of goods (I guess that makes him sort of Jacobs focussed, rather than Childes). To develop the theory, Christaller made two assumptions: all land is flat and equal in value and the actors are economically rational. What he concluded was that there was an actual system to size and spacing of places (a hierarchical model of hamlet, village, town, city and regional capital). He also made a geometrical model of hexagons demonstrating how far a market stretched before the need for a new market.
The rigidity of Christaller's model got him into trouble. Losche came along and saved the day. Losche allowed one central place to have all the central goods and services present in the economic system. He assumed that many markets operated simultaneously. He then tried to find the least number of centers necessary. He also incorporated transportation into his formula although it is vague how (pg 146).
There is a nice model on pg 147 of how they compare.
Preference Structure
The preference structure models have more to do with the psychology of the customer and consumer behavior. Different methods of analysis were used to determine trends and the trends were placed spatially. For instance it was concluded that both distance and town size are relevant stimuli for a consumer shopping behavior. People are willing to bypass a small town to go to a town with more options but is farther away. This obviously affects the regional development of areas as well and should be taken into account as transportation costs continue to decrease.
Christaller also gets into trouble without being able to adjust to a periodic market (an inconsistent market) and wholesaling. Basically--central place is really rigid making it more of a special case than the general growth pattern.
CPT is applicable to planning new settlements. "in the end, the utility of a theory is demonstrated not in its mathematical elegance of esoteric theorems, but in its relevance in resolving real world problems."
Terms:
threshold: amount of purchasing power required to support a person engaged in a tertiary business activity
range of a good: the market area for the good (the distance people travel to purchase a good)
low-order goods are goods that everyone needs and are sold rather cheaply and high order goods are goods like jewelery that involve larger expenditures per trip in both time and money.
centrality:
size and spacing: 5 tiered hierarchical system (hamlet, village, town, city, regional capital)
functional hierarchy
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